


A Europolis of Us

by Spocksandshoes



Category: Den lengste reisen | The Longest Journey, Dreamfall, Dreamfall Chapters
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Enemies to Lovers, Eventual Smut, M/M, Slow Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2016-06-22
Packaged: 2018-05-08 20:23:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5511854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spocksandshoes/pseuds/Spocksandshoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kian Alvane is a High Ranking officer for the EYE, the corrupt military force occupying the Dystopian city of Propast. It's all going sort-of okay until he's involved with the disappearance of a prominent anti-EYE rebel.</p><p> And then, with the help of an angry one-eyed man and a whole lot of treason, everything goes downhill and stays there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Reborn

THE EYE LIES.

Kian sighed and scrubbed a hand over his eyes, willing the ache to go away.  
His hand came away damp, and he blinked furiously, trying to force his tired, protesting eyes to stay open.

The office was quiet at his hour, only the steady beeping of machines and the Cleanerbots whirring by to keep him company as he worked, studying virtual map after map of the city, the layers and sewers and secret passages, all layered up on top of each other in a digital representation of Propast.

 _Propast. The sewer of Europolis._ Kian thought, jabbing his finger at a point in the map and leaving a small imprint that automatically saved itself for later.  
''There, and there. Save this to the Overseers terminal and have it sent out to the raid teams as soon as the new shift starts.''

The computer beeped in agreement as he braced his hands off his desk and stood, stretching with a pained wince as his back cracked. He grabbed his jacket and headed from the office, blearily managing to stand in the elevator on the way down.

Five raids in three days, and he'd overseen all of them. Four resistance caches, two lieutenants, and a low-level grunt for their troubles. Oh, and the leader of the god-damn resistance.  
Kian knew he should feel elated, but all he felt was disdain whenever some suited beaureacrat from higher up the food chain shook his hand for it.

THE EYE LIES.  
The signs were everywhere, even at three in the morning, graffiti had mysteriously appeared across the street, neon green and unmissable. 

THE EYE LIES.

A young couple walked by, carrying registered permission cards. Probably workers of some kind, up early to start their shifts.  
They stared at him expressionlessly as he walked by.

Kian didn't stop, he knew what they were thinking. Five raids. Seven dead. Four captured. The news was everywhere, blaring from WATIcorp screens that covered every spare inch of wallspace.  
The EYE had taken down one of the Leaders of the anti -EYE resistance, and it was because of him.

Kian frowned at nothing, and quickened his step, trying to get away from his own thoughts.

He had seen the Infamous Sun-bringer tranq-ed and cuffed, a shock collar clamped around her limp neck as they loaded her up for transport in a high-security vehicle.  
This close, she was just an ordinary woman, her dark hair shook loose and lank, blood flecks and dust on her cheeks.  
She could have been anyone, certainly not the defiant, near-mythological figure splashed across the billboards, certainly not the woman in cobbled-together body armour, the behemoth that scared the EYE so much they tried to silence her.  
''SUN-BRINGER'' He understood the nickname when she had been a myth. Seeing her in the flesh, he didn't understand. 

There wasn't anything mighty about a bruised prisoner dozing in a restraint collar.  
And as she lost consciousness, her head lolled to the side and she muttered. ''It's only a title.''

He hadn't been prepared for the wave of empathy that left him dizzy and sickened, hating himself for this.  
But, of course he kept that to himself when the Overseers came to congratulate him.

Chinatown was still bright and bustling by the rivers, even in the early hours. He knew without looking that every one of the people buying and selling at the stalls here had a curfew card. What he didn't know was how legitimate any of them were.

The tea was lukewarm and bitter, the small lady serving it was even colder, but he thanked her and continue on his way, nursing the synth- paper cup of cooling jasmine tea til the neon lights of central Propast were blissfully shut out by his apartment building.  
Half asleep, he ran his ID cards, submitted to an iris and fingerprint scan, and stumbled gratefully into his own apartment, making a beeline for the bed.

He was asleep before his head hit the pillow.

 

His dreams were grey.

****

Kian woke, still in his sweaty rumpled clothes from the day before. Groaning, he peeled his face from the bed and sat up, staring around his apartment. His plant needed watering. 

Kian watered his plant, worked out, had a shower, trimmed his beard, and stared in the mirror for ten minutes instead of making breakfast. Listless, he made some coffee and headed into work.

He worked til he was dozing off and headed home to sleep and hope in vain that he could sleep through his day off.

****

Woke late. Talked to plant. He bought some spices- he was out of Turmeric- and went to his scheduled company appointment at Seshadri towers. He told the company-appointed shrink what she wanted to hear, and went home.  
Koottu Curry and a work-out. He spent the company-allotted time in the WATICorp Dream machine, thinking up of a blank room, devoid of space, with a comfy bed in the middle of it.  
He got into the bed, and fell asleep, only waking when his real-life bladder bade him to pull off the machine and go take a piss.

He browsed the Propast intranet, looking for pet shops that sold rats. He had been toying with the idea of getting one as a pet for years now, but it was hard to summon up the energy to. So he amused himself by looking anyways, hoping the inspiration to seize the moment and impulse-buy would take over.  
It never did.

He made himself eggs, went back to bed and ate staring at the ceiling, which was harder than it looked.  
4:05 am

The next two hours were spent staring at the same spot in the ceiling and feeling vaguely restless and unhappy.

6:30 am. Get up, work out, shower, buy shitty coffee on the way to work. Train recruits. Organise and strategise. Meetings. 

Work til the office was empty and his eyes cramped in his skull. Go home. Rinse, repeat.

Grey dreams. Grey sky. THE EYE LIES.

And then on Thursday, he came home and they were waiting for him.

***

The apartment was quiet as he toed his shoes off and shrugged out of his coat and shirt.

It was his first apartment, he had reasoned at the start, he could dress how he wanted, but he would maintain class and digni- yeah, by the second week it was lucky if he had underwear on when he was home alone. 

He yawned, tired, dragging himself towards his bed, and stopped, feeling hairs prickle on the back of his neck. Something was wrong. No, something was here.

The window in the open-plan living room was open. It was open, and it very much hadn't been when he left that morning. Kian took a step backwards, towards the knife drawer, and squinted into the gloom. 

The shadow to the right of the bedroom door came for him first, peeling away from the wall and making a beeline for the kitchen.  
_Jump back, reach for nearest weapon. Smash them across the face with it. While they stagger back, use the opportunity._

The person reeled with a sharp cry, vase shards crumbling in their hair, and he grabbed their head in his hands and swung it at the nearest wall. They crumpled with a grunt. 

The second shadow had moved, flanking him and the dig to the ribs had him staggering, but adrenaline pumping, he dove at the attacker, forcing them back. _High hit, then low, keep them moving backwards. Stomach is unprotected, left side possibly has an old scar. Aim there._  
The fight was short and brutal, and, with an arm jammed to the attackers throat, he scanned the room for other assailants as their gloved fingers scrabbled helplessly at his face. 

If he hadn't been tired and surprised and working on instinct he might have moved faster, but caught off guard, he was sloppy.  
The window was open, and it was only as the sting hit the back of his neck did Kian realised that it wasn't opened for assailants to enter the apartment by.

He shut his eyes and groaned as the darkness hit him like a freight train.

***

The lights clicked back on, and Kian regretted it immediately. His body went from zero to alarm in seconds, following a rush of nausea that made his mouth water. Fight or flight. He blinked, and something rough moved around his face, shaking grit into his eyes. He blinked rapidly and swore, going to strain against the binds but a burst of static from his numb limbs put paid to that plan.

He swallowed, and tasted vomit. A knock-out drug. The apartment. How on earth...

Shit.

A door crashed open in the distance, metal on concrete and he tensed, listening his surroundings.

Footsteps grew closer, maybe three people. One was forward and decisive- male?, one was limping, and one seemed to be trying to make as little noise as possible. 

The bag was ripped off his head and the lights blinded him.

When his retinas stopped screaming and the room faded back into view, Kian got his first look at the host of this complete debacle. The man was flanked by two women wearing masks out of old Dream-Machines, so their faces were blank, but the man radiated nothing but distaste.

The man crouched, and stared quietly at the prisoner, who had to fight to keep his face carefully blank.  
Shit. Shit, he had thought this bastard was dead. 

The man looked to be about his own age, but his life had been harder- no beard oils or top-notch medical care for this one. His beard was scruffy and uneven, hair scraped back into a ponytail. Well-built, but it wasn't for show, it was the body of someone who learned for survive on the bare necessities. Someone who fought for all the scraps they had ever gotten.

Kian, with his smooth beard and gym-built bulk, felt obnoxious in comparison. The man had only one eye, the other was a metal plate seemingly welded to his socket, a bright blue light flickering in the eyeball-shaped cybernetic limb. 

It was sort of funny, Kian thought to himself, with only a faint stab of guilt the leader of the Anti-EYE had only one eye. 

The man looked him over like he was staring at a piece of shit on his shoe and 'huh'ed, sitting back on the balls of his feet. ''I am Likho. What is your name, EYE?'' His voice was deep, reverberating, like he'd chain-smoked for years. But his teeth and fingernails weren't yellow. He didn't smell of contraband cigarettes. 

''Kian Alvane.'' The man knew that, Kian knew. He had to. This was a test.

''Who do you work for?''

''I wouldn't be here if you didn't know the answer to that.''

''Who do you work for?'' There was an edge to his voice this time. Kian thought of the training manual for abductions, and answered.

''EYE, Operations Division.''

''Where are you from, EYE?''

''South Europolis, middle-eastern descent.''

''You're very talkative for an EYE.''

''I'm not telling you anything that isn't public knowledge.'' He moved his wrists slowly, looking for a weak point he knew wasn't there. He needed to feel like he was doing something to aid an escape.

''Then perhaps it's about time you did.'' The man's voice was low, calm, and Kian didn't like it. The calm ones were the ones to be wary of. The anger behind that quiet wasn't hid well.

"Last Monday you staged an arrest in the Markets. You captured a woman we want back.''

''Sun-Bringer.'' Kian said, and Likho's lips tightened in response. He wasn't so much worrying as radiating concern. Kian could have smiled. There was a reason they'd taken him off street-patrols and put him in charge of finding people- bastards like this one wore their hearts on their sleeves.

''So. Ransom. Me, for her.''

''That's none of your concern. I want to know if she's still alive.''

''If you know who I am then you know I don't know that.'' Kian had to pause and swallow, fight back the vomit rising in his throat.  
Black market sedatives are a hell of a thing. ''EYE is divided into sectors. Containment is none of my business.''

''But you do know who know the man in charge of Containment.''

''Yes.'' He couldn't help but have his lip curl in distaste as he thought of Officer Vamon, and he knew Likho noticed.  
If the term 'Bastard' had a picture to accompany it, it would be this Vamon dickheads face, he was sure of it.

''What does he plan to do with Sun-bringer?''

''If she's got the information that they think she has, interrogation and death.''  
He was barely done speaking by the time Likho turned on his heel and walked away. The door slammed, leaving him in darkness.

Kian took a deep breath, and let it out as slowly as he could, wishing he still had a deity to pray to.

***

Hours passed in the dark, and a bowl of congealing cheese soup was pushed in front of him, with dry ration-crackers.  
His hands were still tied. Humiliation tactics, he thought sourly. But he ate, straining down to slobber at the cooling broth, bruising his gums trying to pick up the angular shards of dried bread in his mouth. He was no use to anyone hungry. 

_If you stare at the sun too long, it'll hurt your eyes._ Kian remembered someone telling him. He guessed that was why the codename.  
The Sun-bringer could hurt the EYE, the name using word play and shared nostalgia to make people feel safe.  
He hummed to keep himself company, an old song about the sea, and thought of the woman they called Sun-bringer, and wondered if she'd forgive him.

***

They uncuffed him and let him walk around the empty room the next day.  
The first few minutes were spent crawling, rubbing life back into his numb limbs. 

''You never told me your name.'' They hadn't locked him up again, letting him use the room as his cell with one wrist cuffed to the support beam in the middle. Likho was in the corner, on watch. The man had been sitting in the corner for hours, silently sharpening his knives and ignoring the prisoner, but at Kians words, his one human eye flickered up. The mechanical one stayed riveted to the knives as he slowly scraped a whetstone along one dull blade.

The sound put Kians teeth on edge.

''You know my name, Alvane.'' He said, and Kian shrugged. ''We've never been formally introduced. And I'm not going anywhere. '' He jangled the chain to make a point.

''You might be if you don't stay quiet.'' 

''Likho. That's what the others call you now, right? The one-eyed monster, popular myth in North Europolis. Not a bad codename.'' Kian was not to be deterred, using his low, quiet voice to make Likho strain to listen to him. If he was being held in an abandoned bunker of some kind, the most he could get is a conversation.

''It's my real name now. ''

''Not according to EYE data.''

''I don't give a piss about EYE data.'' Likho stared at him. ''Codenames are important around here, EYE. Do you know what they call you?''

Kian shrugged. He didn't know if he wanted to know.

Likho continued anyways. ''Apostle. ''

''A divine follower.''

''A glorified lap-dog.''

Kian thought about the woman's words to him. ''It's only a title.'' He said. Likho didn't reply.

***

After three days, of darkness punctured by brief changes-of the guard, he was cuffed, bagged, and pushed down a narrow echoing corridor and into a narrow bathroom with a trough of ice-cold water.

'Bathroom' was a bit of an overstatement.

'Room' was nearly an overstatement.

A rough towel frankenstiened from other pieces of towels, and a flat packet of dried soap was shoved into his hands, and the door slammed behind him, leaving him alone.

The towel and soap were set aside and he carefully searched the bathroom, pressing on walls and prising open small grates. Annoyingly, he found it empty of anything he could use, and instead bathed, shivering in the ice-water. 

It felt good to be clean again, even if the towel was like rubbing sandpaper over himself. The dust and sweat was gone, and he stretched, savouring the quiet moment. They brought him clothes, soft worn things that were tight across the shoulders and baggy at the waist.  
He forced himself not to think of who they belonged to, pulling them on and combing his hair and beard as best he could without his fingers.

He was glad there wasn't a mirror. He didn't think he'd like who he saw in it.

Eventually, a slot in the metal door screeched opened, and he put his wrists through to be cuffed again. 

Clothed and clean, the guards lead him through the corridors, a bag securely around his head again. Sometimes laughter could be heard, footsteps and noises from afar, but they always quieted as Kian passed. They looped the same area a few times, he guessed, stumbling along as best he could.

He was left sitting in a cold concrete room with two seats and wet walls. The ceiling sloped, grated at the top, lit by sickly old-style halogen lights. The constant drip-drip of water kept him company til the metal door was pushed open and Likho sauntered in, flopping in the chair across from him and beginning to read from a list of what Kian recognised as information about himself. 

"Kian Alvane. Age 36, Born in the Turkish district of Europolis to immigrant parents. Rough upbringing. Joined the Syndicate age 18. Loyal dog ever since." Likho's cybernetic eye flickered as more information seemed to load.

"I joined the EYE." Kian corrected, wondering why it bothered him. That was a lie- he knew exactly why it bothered him. Because Likho was right.  
"Not the Syndicate."

"Don't matter if you're fucking the janitor or the CEO, you're still being fucked." Likho spat, and Kian didn't like admitting he was right. The EYE was the syndicate, in action if not in name.

''Address listed as upper Riverside Plaza, block 4, penthouse suite. Blood type 0-. Openly Homosexual. Registered minor depressive episodes.'' Likho idly resumed his scrolling. Kian stared stonily at the walls. 

"Responsible for thirteen successful raids, three unsuccessful ones, and a grand total of seventy-two rebel arrests and 15 deaths. I bet you're proud." Likho's voice became a drawl, human eye flickering up to pin Kian with disdain. 

"I did my job."

"Your job? Oh I know all about you doing your job.'' He jabbed a stiff finger at the metal plating surrounding the blue light that passed for an eyeball. ''You remember this, Apostle?''

Kian nodded slowly, and made a mental note. So Likho did hold grudges, good to know.  
''eight..nine years ago?''

''Ten. A face full of shrapnel. It's a miracle the crap Manifesto doctors didn't have my other eye out too.''

Kian took a slow, deep breath, like the shrink had said, and centred himself. He was in charge of the memory. It didn't rule him. 

_The rebels were running, a rag-tag group of anti-Syndicate thugs caught off guard as they raided a security detail of Alliance of European Democrats for Freedom and Liberty. Ambushed, they'd ran, and he'd fired a shot into the weaponry containers nearby. It had been a horrible mix of instinct and the disregard for life, he thought. He remembered Likho, close-cropped white hair and broad shoulders, being lifted and tossed by the shockwave like a ragdoll. He remembered the sight of a man screaming, a shard of glass pushing wetly from his eye-socket._

Not for the first time, the officer felt genuine revulsion against himself and winced.

"....I'm sorry."

"Don't lie to me." 

"I'm not. " He meant it, and he sensed Likho knew, because the man frowned and tried another tactic, refusing to let him go with just an apology.

"And the rebels you've killed? The people you've oppressed? You sorry about them too?"

"Would it matter to you if I was??"

''Maybe. If you give me a good reason to do it in the first place.''

"You want a reason?'' Kian felt himself snap. He was tired, and hungry, and sore, chained up for days with no heat or movement. He was cramped, and uneasy, and it got the better of him.  
''You read my files, you know what I came from.'' He couldn't help but scowl, as his old, rough accent broke through for a moment, scraping at the syllables and rounding out those awful vowels. 

" You think I don't know EYE is corrupt? By the time I realised I was making a mistake, I was years into a career they don't let you walk away from. '' His hands moved of their own accord, crooked fingers forcing themselves through the tangles in his damp hair. The knots caught and pulled and the pain gave him something to focus on other than all that guilt, springing up from where it was usually forced to hide in the bottom of his mind somewhere.

'' It doesn't excuse the things I've done, I know that. But I am sorry."

Likho leaned forward, his one eye bright. They stared at each other for a few moments, before Likho's head tilted at an angle. 

"If you didn't disgust me, Apostle, I'd almost find you interesting."

 ''I'll take that as a compliment.

***

''Stand up straight, Apostle.'' There was a prod, and Kian straightened his back. Hands fumbled at his shirt, pushing the material down his arms to fit a stiff fabric over his chest, clipping it around his back before pulling his shirt back on. Under-armour.

''Thank you.'' He said, and received a grunt in reply. ''You aint no good to the EYE if you're dead, Apostle.''  
''Just in case things get dicey out there. Our snipers aint too fond of you.''

''I'm not too fond of them either.'' The metal box they were in stank of human warmth and sweat. There was a bag over his head, rumblings shaking the box. Traffic, bot production lines, wind? He couldn't tell.

The rebels were trembling, he could feel it vibrating in their shoulders in the close- quarters.

A quick swap, was what Likho had said. But nobody there seemed to act like it was that casual.

''Here they come.'' Someone whispered in the fetid air.

The doors were flung over and cold, sharp air flooded in. A rush of noise and blinding light through the bag. People rushing, footsteps clanking over metal. Where were they, an old Dream Factory? Not the city centre, that was obvious. The abandoned metro lines?

A warm hand pressed against his spine and pushed him forward, out into the cold.

He stood there for an age, blind and feeling expose. The sharp wind sliced along his skin, and he hunched automatically to break the freeze, feeling too exposed.

''There's your man!'' He heard someone shout, voice caught and thrown by the wind. ''An eye for an EYE! Give us our woman, we had a deal!''

Really? Puns? Wow.

Kian stood there, waiting, for moments, straining to hear the familiar clank of heavy armoured boots on metal, the hands of teammates pulling him to safety.  
Just a few seconds, then he'd be shot of this, being debriefed somewhere with proper heating. Back to his old life of-

The pain hit instantly, searing hot in his chest, burning, burning, flooding him with pain. His head smacked against the metal floor with a dull crack and people started to shout.  
People were running. Noise erupted from everywhere, chaos and screaming, and the bag was still over his head. 

His chest was spiking hot and it was burning deep, immobilising and cruel. This was a kill-shot, he realised dumbly.  
The mark 4 pulse rifle was an EYE favourite for crowd suppression, used to put rioters down and keep them down.

Bodies thudded down beside him and someone was swearing, hands grabbing his arms and pulling him up. ''Help me with him!''  
Other hands joined in, dragging him along, and down, to the dark.

***

_It's only a title. The woman was telling him, smiling. And then she pushed her hand into his chest, breaking through his skin and twisting in the flesh of his chest, his blood boiling and blackening where she touched._

Kian opened his eyes. He was in a small room with the same slate-grey bunker walls, in a small bed that his feet hung out over the end of.  
Likho was sitting by his bed, head in his hands. He looked old, suddenly. And tired.  
Kian knew how he felt.

He felt exhausted , suddenly, bitter. It hurt to think he was a puppet for EYE, even though he had always known it. Maybe, he thought wearily, it had been fun to think of them as a substitute family. Maybe it had been fun for them to encourage his delusion.  
Useless. Unnecessary. A loose end. A liability.

His own hand patted clumsily at his chest, finding it was swaddled in bandages, a sharp, mintish spell seeping from them.  
His head span, courtesy of the drip intravenously feeding something into his wrist. Drips were decades out of place in modern hospitals, but then again, he was lying in an underground bunker. He took what he could get.

''How many did you lose?'' He croaked eventually, and Likho's head snapped up. ''Five.'' He said eventually, and he sounded sad.  
''You're useless to them. The bastards didn't trade.''

''Nice of them.'' Kian muttered. His head flopped back unto whatever was passing for a pillow, his fingers gingerly pressing at his chest through the thick bandaging. ''A woman gave me a vest. The pulse would have stopped my heart otherwise'' He was starting to think she shouldn't have bothered. No home, no job, hunted and useless. If 'Life' was her gift to him, he was going to want the receipt.

''I know. I told her to give it to you.''

''Why not just let me die?''

''Because someone a lot better than the both of us believes in mercy.''

***

When the drip could be removed, he was sat up in bed and re-cuffed, dozing in and out of sleep for days, awakening for food, then falling asleep again. There was no other reason to be awake.

But, food, that meant he was alive for something. If he wasn't a bargaining chip, Kian thought warily, on a day that had blended into a night, spooning dried scrambled egg rations into his mouth. If not a Bargaining chip, then what was he? Why was he still alive?

The person that brought the his evening food was still there when he looked up. With a certain jolt of uneasiness, Kian realised it was a little boy- no older than about ten. The boy was thin and small, with too-long limbs and too-small shoes, a big crop of dark hair and brown eyes, and he watched Kian in fascination, like a creature in a holo-museum.

''You eat like a pig.'' The boy told him after a while, pulling a synthesised tissue from his sleeve and smushing it across Kians face without hesitation. He made a face, feeling the cold leftovers settle in his beard as the boy tried to clean the edible slop up.

''There!'' The boy exclaimed cheerfully, after a few minutes of making sure the prisoners' beard wasn't disgusting, and Kian nodded quietly and returned to eating, pausing after he'd finished the lumpy gelatinous soup that counted as desert. 

The boy was still there.

''Do you want something?'' Kian asked, looking back up.  
The boy shrugged. ''I'm Bip.'' He offered. 

''Bip. I'm.. Kian.''

''I know.'' Bip sat down cross-legged on the floor, and stared up at him. ''I saw them carry you in here. They said your name was Kian Apostle.''

''Alvane.''

''Avaline.''

''Al-van-e.''

''That's a silly name.'' Bip decided, and Kian opened his mouth to tell him that a boy called 'Bip' should shut up about names, but decided against it. 

''I think it's Turkish.'' He said instead, going back to prodding the jiggling remains of the gel.

''You think? Don't you know?''

''No.''

''You're unfriendly.''

Kian counted to ten in his head before replying. ''What are you doing here, Bip?''

''I live here! Well, in the other rebel place with the other Orphans.'' 

''...The other orphans?''

''Yeah, there's loads of us! Our parents get taken or they get zapped.-'' Bip formed a gun with his fingers and made a _'pew! pew!'_ motion. ''- and then Sun-bringer said we could stay here.''

It seemed like an odd amount of information to give someone, Kian realised suddenly. Either he was trying to badly interrogate the prisoner, or..  
Or, Kian thought triumphantly, or Bip wasn't supposed to be here.

''Likho didn't send you here, did he?'' He interrupted as calmly as he could, and Bip fidgeted.

''Not....'xcactly....''

''It's okay, you're not in trouble.'' Kian told him, trying to muster a kindly voice. He sounded constipated.  
''Do you want to ask me if Sun-Bringer is okay?''

There was a brief pause, and the mop of dark hair flopped as Bip nodded furiously.

''We'll get her back.'' Kian assured the boy, and he had no idea why he said it, but he also knew there was no way he could do anything else.

''You promise?''

''....I promise.''

Shit.

***

He was still lying in his bed, staring at the wall, when Likho appeared at the door.

Likho was silent, his bright cybernetic eye flickering as he stared at the bottom of Kians' bed. Kian knew a defeated man when he saw one, but he also knew the look of a man who'd keep fighting til that defeat killed him. Anger and fear were so closely intertwined.

''I was there when Sun-Bringer was arrested.'' He started, and could see the blue gleam from the corner of his eyes, Likho's gaze riveted unto the side of his face.

''She said something. It's just a title. I think I understand. ''

''You understand.'' Likho sounded sceptical, and Kian couldn't blame him.

''Your Sun-bringer was just.. a woman. In the EYE, you start to see people as just rebels. Targets. But her, I saw her as a person again, and..'' His voice wavered, a block of emotion stuck in his throat, and he shook his head. 

Likho hadn't spoken, but he had nodded quietly.

''I can't go back.'' Kian admitted eventually. ''Something clicked in my head, and I can't ignore what we've done.'' 

Likho considered it for a moment. ''You'll be under heavy guard.'' He warned eventually. ''If I even think you're double-crossing me...''

''Double-crossing you? To who? I don't have an ally in the damn world. If you have me, you'll be my first.''

Likho let Kian's hand hang in the air for a few moments, before shaking it. 

''Don't make me regret this.''


	2. Rebels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life with the underground branch of rebels in a Dystopian future was going about exactly as you'd expect.

''So, whets it like to live on the surface? Did you ever meet that nice lady from the Unity party? She always looks so lovely on the Wire. Her ads are everywhere, and she's against Dietr Gross so she has to be good, right? Is politics as awkward and boring on the surface as it is with us?''

Kian tried to concentrate, squatting to peer over the roof to the guards far below. He tried to tune the chattering out too, but Enu didn't seem to notice, talking as fast as she possibly could, stopping occasionally to suck in a deep breath before continuing her tirade.

''And whats Sashedri tower like on the inside? What do you go there for? Oh! I'm sorry, you don't have to answer that if you don't want to, but it looks so swanky on the inside!''

Kian tuned her out, keeping an eye on the guards, taking mental notes. Enu fidgeted beside him.   
As far as he could tell, she had been a Dragonfly til she got too old, and joined the actual Rebels. She was bouncy and bubbly and talked a lot, but he knew absolutely nothing about her as a person. He suspected that was on purpose.   
She had this happy, innocent thing going on that made her easy to overlook, he guessed. Maybe that why Likho saddled him with the chatterbox for the stake-out.

Or maybe it was because Enu had laid eyes on him and shouted 'DIBS!'  
Either or.

''Has club Bitte really been raided? I've always wanted to try their colourful drinks with the little umbrellas, it's so cute! I'm sorry, am I talking to much? Oh, I bet I am. Do you have a girlfriend?''

''No.''

''What? Why! You're gorgeous! I mean, not in a..well, you ARE, but I didn't...''

''Gay.''

''Oh! Okay, cool! Do you have a boyfriend? Oooh, he is in EYE too? Is there a star-crossed lovers thing going on!??!''

''No boyfriend.''

''Oh. Hey, I could set you up! Jakai is so quiet no-one knows what he likes, but Likho's single!''

''I thought Likho was more interested in scowling than romance.''

Enu giggled. ''Ha! Oh no, think he heard that on the wire?''

''I heard that.'' Came a distinct voice, and Enu groaned. ''Here we go, latrine duty for a month. I'm only trying to find you love, you shouldn't punish that, grumpy!''

''I don't need an ex-fascists pity.''

Kian made a noise that could have been a snort, but it was too cold to tell. ''That's a shame, because I'm here fawning over you.''

''Do you have the routes or not?!''

''Nearly. There was an early guard-change, I think they've changed the roster.''

Likho swore in his ear. ''Upped security. I fucking knew it.''

''I'm updating our old rosters to match their new ones. Changes every 45.2 minutes on the main doors and smaller rotations around the Seraph Kavana every.....10? It's hard to tell yet.''

''Just get the info.''

******  
The rebels hideout was actually a bunch of interconnecting bunkers far underneath the old sewage lines. Somewhere under the bot factories, he guessed, as the cold steel and sloping concrete had the look of the underground systems. 

Water dripped from somewhere when it rained, and the air-recycling units either stopped working half the time- which made the air smell like the sewers above on bad days, or they were so loud and inconvenient that the choice between getting an awful smell and getting some sleep was one that had to be made, and often.

His room was the size of a wardrobe in his old apartment, with a box to keep his stuff in, and a bed. The clothes he wore, everything else, was the rebels. He had nothing, but this shit room.  
But he slept better in this small, shit room. It reminded him of a home before, a fleeting memory of somewhere quiet and cold and closed-in.

It went without saying that the rebels were not delighted with the idea of an ex-eye operative in the base. But he tried to ignore it- the important thing was the good he was doing by being there, right? The constant questions, the maps upon maps and lists of weaponry and personnel codes, the constant shadowing were almost enough to keep him so busy he didnt notice. Almost.

Bip found Kian scrubbing a red 'X' off of his door. The boy sat on the floor and watching Kian sluice the paint away, pink from the elbows down.

''Did you do that?''

''No.''

''Who did then?''

''Someone who doesn't like me.''

''That could be anyone.'' 

Kian shot Bip a sharp look, but the kid looked completely serious.

''I suppose.'' He admitted. Someone had spat at his feet the other day. In hindsight, he was glad it hadn't been in his face. 

''But that's their problem.''

***

''Why 'Sun-bringer?'' He asked eventually, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his eyes. They had been mapping out compounds for days now, squeezing him for every last drop of information, and damnit he was tired.  
He yawned, half-heartedly covering his mouth as he did, so, gingerly rubbing the tender spot on his chest where he was still healing.

Everything hurt.

''April.'' Likho didn't take his eyes off of the map spread between them, instead turning the data pad to see the EYE compound from another angle.

''What about it?''

''Her name. That's her name- how do you not know this?''

Kian shrugged. In all honesty, he'd never cared enough to ask. ''EYE have their codenames too.''

''...what did you call her.''

''Scorpion.'' He thought Likho was about to pick up the nearly solid object and lamp him with it, but the moment passed, and Likho went back to his work. Kian raised his legs off the floor and stretched til his bones cracked. 

''Her name is April. Sun-bringer came from-''

''The fact that the sun can damage your eyes?''

''Well, yes, but...'' Likho grimaced, idly scratching his beard. He looked like it physically pained him to admit it. ''It's a pun. Sunny days start in the month of April.''

''......... The woman that EYE fears made her codename off of a pun.''

''Yes.'' Likho sounded.. Kian didn't know how he sounded, but he knew that that tone in Likho's voice made him wistful for something he'd never been a part of.

He leaned over the map again, and forced himself not think about April Ryan, the pale dirt-streaked woman who had the power to bring down a system, who cared for the weak and who made puns.

***

Kian hit the ground and the air wisped out of his lungs. He stared at the ceiling, massaging his chest like he could coax the oxygen back. Likho loomed into view, paled in the harsh overhead lighting. He was upside-down from this angle.   
Sweat beads slipped from the man's dark forehead and gathered at the edges of the blue fake eye.

''Get up.''

''Give me a second.'' He gasped, pushing himself up to a sitting position, and closing his eyes, listening to his own body. The wound thumped with hurt, dull and insistent, but he was okay.   
''Alright.'' He pushed himself to his feet. His competitor had backed off, standing against the wall again.   
He thought she was the woman who gave him the vest before he was shot.

''Go ahead.'' Likho motioned the next person forward to the man, a young, squat man who cracked his knuckles and bounced on the balls of his feet. He was fresh, newly warmed-up, and Kian ached, sweaty and tired. He'd fought how many of them so far? But Likho kept them coming, trying to test something, no doubt.

The man moved, and Kian let go.

_He's eager. A body-rush. Throw off his momentum, duck low, and knock him off his feet. Pin him. He'll try to throw you off. Pressure-point under the arm. Apply pressure til he complies._  
The fight was over in under a minute.

''So far, one two people have gotten the upper hand with Apostle.'' Likho stepped in, breaking them up. The man staggered back to the wall, nursing his sore arm.

''Every single one of the rest of you failed. What have we learned? Bob!''

An old man sporting a black eye shrugged. ''He's a big bugger.''

His answer brought snickers, but Likho glared til they fell silent. 

''Suppression tactics.'' A young blonde man spoke up. ''His pattern is to end the fight as quickly as possible. Pick out the weakness, and exploit it.'' 

''He's good.'' Kian jabbed a chin his direction, and the man smiled. 

''EYE teaches us to evaluate a person. We take them apart in our heads before we take them down. Fighting fancy is worth shit if you can't fight fast. Your weakness is your ankle. Yours is your overconfidence. You're shell-shocked. You're afraid of people touching your face. You're indecisive.''  
He paused, realised he had worked down the queue from Jakai to where Likho stood.

''What about boss-man?'' Someone asked, and Kian knew. 

He had known the moment he saw Likho, weeks ago. Like he'd thought then. The man wore his heart on his sleeve. His weakness was April Ryan. _Mention April, get him angry, get him making mistakes. Take him down._

''Cybernetic eye.'' He lied, after a moment of the two men staring at each other. There was a flicker of relief in Likho's eyes, before he nodded and looked away.

''Any cybernetic limb is weakest where it joins with organic tissue. But you all knew that. If your leader allows, I can teach you how to fight like an EYE operative. And then how to fight better than one.''

***

Kian stepped out of the bathroom, towelling his beard off, and nearly walked face-first into Likho. The compound was quiet at night, harsh lights buzzing along the bare concrete halls. He hadn't been able to sleep, restlessness itching under his skin til he forced himself to work out and shower. 

''...Likho.'' Kian said after a moment, slowly sidestepping the man and heading to his own bunk, feeling the stare of the Leader burn into his back as he moved away

***

''Your scars.'' 

Likho flopped down across from him in the tiny cramp dank square of bunker that was allocated for food as Kian squeezed the contents of a flat-packed illegal pork-product unto his tin plate and frowned at the smell. 

Pork wasn't supposed to ooze.

''My scars.'' He replied eventually, wishing he had been wearing a shirt for their last meeting. Likho had avoided talking to him as much as possible, it figured that something as random as his scars would be the one thing to make the man want to talk to him.

''You get them with EYE?'' Likho moved to spear the insult to pork on his fork, eyes on Kian as he pilfered the pork and took a bite. His gaze never left the Apostle, who had the distinct feeling that this was another test of some time.

''Some of them.'' Kian returned to topic, gulping down the rest of his water. ''Most of them I got before.''

''Uh-huh.'' Likho made a face and dropped the food to the makeshift table with a clatter. ''That tastes like ass, what are you eating?''

''Something pretending to be pork.'' Kian held up the foil packet, and Likho snatched it out of his hand, scanning the object before looking back up to Kian with an expression of pure disbelief.

''Where did you get this?''

''The cooks. Rations.''

''Dog food, Apostle. You're eating dog food.''

He tossed the packet down on the table between them and stalked away, returning with a tray of lukewarm pea mush and something so bland it could have been squishy paper. But it was food.

Kian swallowed the bile in his throat and took the new tray.

''Thank you.'' He paused, halfway through eating, and offered the tray to Likho, who, after studying him for a moment, shook his head.   
''You eat it. But.. thanks. Kian.''

**

''Go left. Three hundred paces or so.'' Likho was saying, as Kian nodded and slipped away. 

Two hours of silently manoeuvring through air vents and disabling alarms, and they were here. A small bot-factory on the fringe of the city. Was April here? No, but it was a facility under Vamon's command. 

''The cuffs and restraining collars are needed.'' Enu had said, handing him the mission brief. ''Good luck!''

They hadn't come across any guards yet, but that didn't mean anything good, Kian thought as he moved down the empty corridor, towards an unguarded room at the end. Slats of light flickered through the fan-blades slowly whirring over the factory floor, and the entire walkway smelled of heat and metal. 

He had reached the door and tried it. Unlocked. Too easy. The hairs on his arms prickled uneasily.   
Something was wrong. The room was unguarded too.   
The crates were locked, and he picked the nearest one to try and break open, when the shit hit the fan.

Cuffs and Collars. 

''Kian!'' Enus voice crackled in over the headset. She sounded afraid.

''Likho's gone dark. We heard a struggle, you need to help him!''

Kian stopped, stood, calmly turned on his heel and ran back the way he came, through the maze. The corridors were empty, even the exit, where the door stood tantalisingly wide open, freedom beckoning on the far side. He paused for a moment, but steeled himself and picked up the pace, towards Likho.

The corridor was quiet, but something was happening somewhere nearby- shouts and metal hitting metal. Shit, shit. How many of them???  
''Give me backup!'' He shouted into his headset, and without thinking, burst into the room, 

Likho was sitting on a pile of old ammo crates, arms folded, watching him. No EYE members, no bullet-holes. No chaos.

The man slowly raised a hand, which held a small white device, playing the sounds of a riot. He tapped the casing, and the noise stopped.

''Most people didn't think you'd come back.'' Likho commented, casual as you like, and Kian wanted to hit him.   
There was a crackle of noise in the earpiece, laughter and cheering, and Kian realised why there hadn't been any guards. 

The whole bloody thing was a set-up.

''Well, there you go.'' He said shortly, and turned and left.

******

''Kian?'' 

Kian opened his eyes, for one second he was back in his comfy bed in the Plaza, but then reality filtered back in and he was in a thin mattress in a freezing underground bunker, with a tiny mop of hair and dark eyes peering at him from the door. ''What is it, Bip?''

His eyes felt gritty. What time was it, 4am?

Bip sidled into the room, clutching a blanket. ''Had a bad dream.'' He mumbled, eyes heavy with sleep. ''Can I stay here?''

Kian, exasperated, was about to tell him to get lost, but he stopped, and sighed.

''Go on then.'' He rolled out of bed and lifted the covered, gesturing Bip into the warm bed. He slept on the floor, shivering against the concrete.   
But he was _Bips Official Friend_ from then on, and hey, it was nice to have someone on his team.

***

He didn't stop hitting the punching bag til his knuckles were red and everything hurt. Catharsis, his mother had said once.  
He hit the bag hit his hands hurt and then he hit it some more.  
When he stepped back, Likho was leaning on the doorframe, watching him. Kian decided he'd prefer boxing to the alternative. 

Likho watched him for a while, uneasy. ''..Enu told me to come see you.''

Kian ignored him, and continued to hit the bag, shoulders aching. 

''She seems to think you're..upset.'' 

Kian said nothing, and imagined the punching bag was Likho's face.  
A hand grasped Kians' shoulder, a silent command. Likho wasn't used to being ignored. Likho's hand splipped on the sweat.

Kian didn't think, and swung his elbow back. It connected, and Likho stumbled backwards with a grunt. 

What happened next was a blur. 

He was only able to turn around before he was tackled, Likho's weight bearing them down unto the concrete floor. Kains head thudded unto the floor and he honest-to-god saw stars. When they cleared, Likho was sitting on his chest, his nose a mess of blood, splattering down unto Kian's neck.  
Likho raised his fist, and running on instinct Kian whipped his forehead up to meet the fist. It hurt, but Likho gasped out a curse and faltered. 

_Twist. Throw him off. Get up. Use the time. Quick sharp kicks when he's down. Likho was scrambling back, trying to regain his footing. One hit. Then two. Then three._

Likho pulled his legs out from under him. Kian hit the ground and pain burst in one of his kneecaps. A closed fist hit his jaw and he reeled.

_Close-quarters tackle. Take the hit. Wind him. Pin him down. Mention April R_ \- no no. Not ever.

''What the fuck is wrong with you!?!??!'' Likho managed to choke out.

If only he could answer that question, Kian thought sourly, rubbing his jaw. It creaked.

''The whole mission was a set up.'' He spat, shoving Likho as far away from him as he could.

''That was the point. Most of us thought you'd switch sides, or run, given the chance.''

''Run, to where!?!??! You're all I have, such as you are.'' The words didn't really mean to come out, they just kind of... exploded out. No, explosions were forceful. Angry. This was bitter and tired. It _oozed._  
'''I'm with you, Likho. Are you with me?''

Kian stood and walked away. 

The thing that really hurt, he hated to admit, was that he had thought they had had an understanding. 

He had thought Likho and himself were... not friends, but on the same page. That they had each other backs, and he'd ran to save the man.   
God help him, he had been worried. 

Standing there in that warehouse, listening to the rebels celebrate their little trust-fall in-joke, he'd felt like he was being made a fool of. On the outside again. Like when he was a kid and other kids got proud dads and happy moms and warm coats and enough food. Except for Kian Alvane, the strange brown-skinned homeless boy who was different.  
Even in a rag-tag group of misfits, it was still funny to exploit his trust.

He knew maybe he deserved it, and he tried to swallow that old wound, but it stuck in his throat. And it fucking hurt.

Say what you will about EYE, they gave people a home and a sense of belonging.

**

He saw on his bed and dabbed the cuts with a damp cloth. Maybe they stung, but honestly he was seething far too much to notice.

He said nothing when Likho joined him. The crappy bedsprings creaked as the one-eyed man sat, wordlessly holding out his hand for the cloth.

Kian passed it over silently, and Likho pressed it to his bloodied nose with a short sharp exhale. 

''I'm with you.''


	3. Realms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Defying a fascist government and being accepted into a ragtag resistance is tough work. It is also a bad idea. Do you know what's also a bad idea? Making a habit of kissing the leader of the resistance. A lot.
> 
> Kian Alvane is the king of bad decisions.

''Keep on your toes, speed is your friend.''

At the Apostles command, Jakai went up on his toes, feet arcing as he bent his knees. He wobbled a little, but found his purchase, lips pursed in a determined frown. Kian circled him, keeping an eye on the progress of the room. The resistance were so much better than he had found them, and he couldn't help but feel a little proud. They could fight before, but now they could go toe-to-toe with the best of them- or, specifically, Vamons men.

Was he one of them yet? No. But he felt like he'd earned his place here. Nobody had tried to feed him dog food again, and though people still used the name 'Apostle', he decided to take it as a victory. You could be an apostle of many things, Enu had pointed out when they were on watch duty one night. Just because it started out in relation to EYE didn't mean that it would always mean that.

Kian jabbed lazily at Jakai and was pleased when the man took the punch, curling his shoulder forward to cushion the blow, and using the opportunity of Kian's reach to go for his exposed stomach.

Likho stood by the exit. He was supposed to be watching the progress, but he had turned, muttering urgently to someone hidden behind the half-open door. The mans' forehead creased in a frown, and Kian kept one eye on the conversation, trying to guess what it was about.  
Likho and him had found equilibrium since their fight, and..in all honesty, there had been a strange tension between them since it. Not a bad tension, but the sort where neither of them knew what to make of the other.

And maybe it was the fact that he was stuck underground with little to no possible hook-ups, but when you argued enough with someone who insisted on wearing vests that showed off his broad arms, it wasn't too hard to imagine -  
Jakai dodged under his fist and delivered a swift uppercut to his ribcage. 

Ow.

*** 

The holding cell for April was in a facility outside the actual prison quarter. Vamon was there personally overseeing the guard rotations, according to latest Intel. This information was gotten from an EYE operative they had dragged back to the base, half-drugged and still trying to fight.

He lasted interrogation, and when he tried to escape, one of the lieutenants shot him in the back.

Kian pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to keep the stress headache pounding in between his ears at bay. The tired ache of having worked too long and hard was a familiar one, only now without proper painkillers and a comfy climate-controlled apartment, it was somehow 100% worse.

The office space -if it could be called that- was crammed with people, passing Intel and scrawling maps and routes and muttering to each other. That was not helping the thudding headache. 

"Its' going to have to be guerilla tactics on the compound. Fast and dirty. Keep moving, keep them confused and distracted. I'll worry about security, get in, get April, and get out. You all hold the line. "

He paused deliberating his next question. It sat heavy on his tongue and his only concern was that he might get shanked for asking.

"...What information does Sun-Bringer have?"

He was met by distrusting stares, and he exhaled forcefully, running a hand over his face. "Bloody hell, I mean, is it harmful to us if Vamon does get the Intel out of her?!"

A middle-eastern man holding a stack of papers shook his head. "We pulled out of the bases she knew about. Dropped the plans she was part of. '' At Kians' blank stare, the man sighed and elaborated. ''She wanted us to fracture the information so no one knew the whole story. Even her. "

"Wait, so this wasn't our main base?"

"Of course not." Likho said scornfully. "This place is a shithole."

"That ..actually makes a lot of sense." Kian admitted wearily, turning back to the rickety desk piled with old Intel. The ceiling dripped, splashing the maps with rainwater. "So this set you back, but we're not about to be overrun if April tells them what she knows?"

Someone shook their head. 

Kian sighed heavily. Shit.

***

''Heyyy...'' Enu slid into the seat beside him in the cafeteria. She had been tentative since the 'test' in the old factory and even now smiled apologetically at him with her big puppy-dog eyes.  
''Likho said you were building up to the rescue! One big swoop to rescue April, and then things will be back to normal!''

Kian didn't know how to answer, so instead he stabbed the lukewarm beans with his fork and watched them disintegrate into a greasy paste.  
The rebels were set back from the loss of Aprils information, but they still had plans and bases she hadn't known about.  
She wasn't.... vital at all, Kian had realised with a sinking feeling. She was the poster-child of a revolution but kept their secrets safe even from herself. She helped orphaned children, gave people a purpose, but she was just a woman. A part of an organisation that shouldn't have been as important as it was...  
And it baffled him beyond belief.

''Why rescue her?'' He asked abruptly, and suddenly felt every eye at the table on him. The conversations continued in the canteen, but he was pretty sure another wrong word and he'd be turned into a human knife rack.

''Don't get me wrong, I get it, she's the leader. But you have bases, weapons caches, your operations are faltering but still working. She's not essential, logically speaking.'' He backtracked carefully, realising this sounded much colder than he meant it.

''She's family.'' Enu said quietly, and Kian felt like an asshole.

That's why a group of rebels would throw themselves into harm's way for an unimportant piece of the organisation. Because she was their friend. The woman who helped and cared for them.  
He couldn't help but feel jealous- April was missing and her organisation were ready to die to bring her home.

Kian went missing and EYE tried to murder him to tie up loose ends.

It felt so alien to be in a place where you were valued for what you were rather than what you brought to the table.

''But dozens could die doing this, you know that?'' He couldn't let it go, he HAD to know. ''You're effectively throwing yourself at a meat-grinder, here!''  
''Wouldn't you do the same for family?'' Enu asked, and Kian had a brief image of himself bursting into a room he thought was filled with guards and Likho, and shook his head. 

''I don't know. I never had any.''

**** 

"You."  
Kian jabbed a finger at the quiet woman hiding behind the others in the gym. "In the suit."  
She complied, fitting on the scavenged EYE body armour, piece by clunky piece. When the moulded helmet slid down and locked into place, she could have been anyone. A faceless drone of a corrupt empire that reminded Kian uncomfortably of himself not even a year ago.

"Hmm.. You." He picked out a thin, lanky man with acne scars. "Go."

The two opponents stepped into the circle of watching Rebels, and both nodded at each other, before the EYE struck. She went high and the man went low, aiming for the weak points on the armour. She was strong, but he had speed.

The fight ended with a burst of cheers from the room as he managed to rip back the chest plate and mimicked pulled out her heart in gory detail. She faked a rather dramatic death, and as her helmet slid back up to reveal her rosy face, she was beaming as hard as her opponent was.

They glanced up at Kian with such pride, and there was a sudden ache in his chest when he realised they were looking to him for approval.  
He awarded them with an appraising nod, and thought of Vamon.

***

"You asked about my scars."

After some standard recon, they were loitering on a walkway over a mammoth draining system, the tunnel dropping away from them into eternity. Kians voice echoed eerily back to him. _Scars scars scarsscarsscars._  


Somewhere, a clock was striking 4am.  
Likho was smoking.He offered the cigarette to Kian, who shook his head, leaning his elbows on the metal railings, watching the ash flicked from the glowing tip and tumble down into the void underneath them.

"Mm." Was all the reaction he got, but he took it as an invitation to continue.

"Vamon was the leader of a bunch of street boys. He was a year or two older, and tougher, so we followed him like he was the Pied bloody Piper.''  
Likho huffed a dry laugh. ''That's a thought, Alvane.''

"We ran errands, picked fights, whatever her told us to. He was king over the most astoundingly crap Kingdom on the planet.''  
"Then.. there was a scuffle over food this one time- I don't know why he chose to pick on this girl, but he got this look in his eye like he wasn't going to stop the fight til she was dead. So I stepped in. Don't think he ever forgave me for questioning him.''  
Kian stared off into the recesses of the tunnel. ''We both got recruited at 18. It didn't seem fair that I had to share my new life with that _ass._ It wasn't just me, there was bad blood there and we were young and stupid and liked feeling superior."

''That's a lot of words, and I still don't know how you got the scars.''

''After the first week of training, we got drunk and fought. He had a glass bottle.''

''So you lost.''

''I wouldn't say that.'' Kian drummed his fingers on the metal banister, tapping the bridge of his own nose to mimic where Vamon's scar sat. ''I had a flick-knife. ''

Likho froze, holding up a hand. Offended, Kian begrudgingly listened, and then he heard it too. Footsteps, clattering closer, from the opening in the wall. A strip of light quivered in the darkness. Searchlights. 

Time scraped to a near-stop, the world hung quiet and still, and Kian had the time to think _'shit'_ before everything sped up again and the world went crazy.

Stumbling into each other, they barrelled off the walkway as shouts erupted behind them. The tunnels were tight and cramped, and horribly echoing, broadcasting their location with every step. The noise behind them increased but whether that was due to their pursuers getting closer or just echoes, he couldn't tell.

"They're sweeping the tunnels. " He managed to hear himself hiss over his thumping heart, sticking as close behind Likho as he could managed. The blackness closed in and the torch beams flickered behind them, searching hands in the dark.  
Up and up, across two cement tunnels, wider and draughty, then left, to sturdier walkways with the hum of bots far above. Another left, through dank tunnels full of slimy walls and prone dream junkies that they had to jump over.

''They're over here!'' 

The familiar clank of heavy EYE armour. Kian forgot everything, and ran.

They ran so long that he lost track of time. All that mattered was the ache in his lungs and the burning in his legs. They ran and ran, looping and climbing and running some more til he thought he was going to die.

Eventually they stalled, alone, and collapsed panting in the underground of an aincient tram line.

He knelt, palms flat on old steel planks, shaking from exertion and sucking in air, trying not to die on the spot. Likho was lying on his own back, hand pressed to his face, wiping the sweat from his forehead with an unsteady hand. The tunnel was silent apart from their ragged breathing, and as the moments passed, they were still alone. 

When he felt like he wasn't in danger of collapsing, he craned his neck to look at Likho, and ended up wheezing out a laugh. Mainly because he would probably just start making breathless disbelieving hoots if he didn't channel this into humour.

Likho's eye followed his gaze to the cigarette stub still in squeezed between his fingers. It was battered and nearly burned right to the filter, but Likho had taken it with them, whether out of accident or spite of not letting EYE disturb him from his 4am smoke.

He got a reluctant grin in return, and Kian reached out, silently motioning for the smoke. The one-eyed man offered him the cigarette, but instead Kian took the dark wrist and gently guided the hand to his mouth. He pressed his lips to the damp crease of Likho's fingers, and took a drag of the cigarettes remains.

God, that was vile, stinging his poor abused lungs. Fuck, it was brilliant. He tilted his head back and savoured the strange satisfaction of the lungful of nicotine simmering through him, shooing the panic-stations back to normal. 

Likho's eyes were riveted to his face. His one good pupil was blown wide, dilated so much the iris was barely viable. He was panting, chest heaving from the chase, and he was staring with the wild fixation of someone who was thinking _'I really shouldn't find that hot'_ to themselves.

Fuck it. 

"Took the last of my cigarette." Likho murmured, so Apostle leaned forward, hand moving from Likho's wrist to gently grip the mans bearded jaw. Likho let him, sitting up to be closer as Kian leaned in. His Leaders lips parted instinctively, their mouths nearly brushing, as Kian breathed the smoke into Likho's mouth, wisps of smoke escaping into the air.

There was something too intimate about their lips hovering in a smoky half kiss for too long, because Likho pressed a hand to the back of Kians neck and closed the gap with a short nudge. It was sweaty and smoky and they were in an abandoned track, for god's sake- but Likho was pulling him down, kissing him hard, and Kian decided to kiss back and forget thinking.

It's not like they were getting back to base tonight anyways.

***

"Hey."

Likho was sitting in his 'office'- the round-ceilinged, dripping space he had once been interrogated in before the ransom. A hacked WATICORP Dream Machine lay in front of him, vibrating slightly against the metal table. EYE watched the wire, so the rebels had found a way around it, it seemed. Kian new better than to ask why. Or how.

He stepped forward, making Likho's eyebrows raise, and he sat up as Kian lifted up his shirt.

''Look.'' He pulled his shirt up to reveal the bruise Jakai had left, ugly and purpling.  
"Jakai did this in the ring. Your admin guy is a better fighter than some EYE operatives."

Likho stood and crossed the room and crouched to see the mark. In slow motion, he mimicked the punch, edges of his knuckles brushing the bruise to judge the angle. He nodded after a thoughtful pause, and dropped his hand.  
"The weak point under the breastplate on riot armour."

Kian nodded, not moving except to drop the hem of his shirt. "And he's a non-combatant. You should see what your lieutenants are doing to each other. EYE won't know what hit them."

Likho's face softened suddenly and he straightened and turned, the abrupt movement catching Kian off-guard.  
"April would be proud of them." There was a catch in his voice, and something like a rush of empathy snagged in Kians' chest. All that weight, lives and plans and rebellion and survival, resting on Likho's shoulders. And he was still trying to make April proud.

"She'd be proud of you." He said, and Likho made a soft, bitter noise.

"I'd give everything to have her back."

"You loved her."

"In a sense." Kian thought that that was it, their bonding session had ended there, but Likho hesitated and turned back.  
"Have you ever met someone so..much better than you?"

This was probably the most tender, honest moment they had ever had, Kian realised.

Which was sad in itself, because it wasn't even a particularly warm moment. They hadn't spoke of the.. moment, since it happened. Which made this moment even weirder, somehow. Was this pleasant? No, it was rough and jagged and they were both hopelessly lost, unbelievable awkward, improbable allies. But here he was real, atoning, surrounded by people who had learned to cheer him on. And Likho was the core of this redemption- a flawed, tired man just fighting his way home.  
And he did sound tired.

A religious sister once told Kian that in life he'd have to carefully chose the hill he wanted to die defending. Right now, he reasoned practically, this was the only hill he had.

This close, he was able to study Likho. And it tugged uncomfortably at his heartstrings. He wasn't a pro at reading people, but it was clear even to him, that Likho was fighting fear off by the bucket-load. The wet, angry glint in his good eye, the shallow breaths, the tense limbs.... good god, the man was so close to drowning, killing himself to stay afloat long enough to save April.

Absently, Kian wondered if Likho had ever seen any value in himself, or if they were more alike than he thought- atoning and choosing his hill. Giving his life to something he saw as more worthwhile than himself.  
Hmmm.

"Yes." He said, and took Likho's face in his hands, and kissed him

If asked afterwards, he couldn't have said why he did that. It just seemed to by the right thing to do- standing so close, sharing air, this big emotional weight over them both... so he did what had worked the last time.

Hands gripped his arms, and Likho was kissing him back.

This wasn't a flirty kiss. Not sexy or sweet, it was necessary. It was survival, like in the tunnel, clinging tight to something to block out the world around them. Vamon didn't exist, April didn't exist, the dank dim hallways of the resistance didn't exist- it was the same principal as going to a bar to pick someone up when work got too heavy. It was a way to forget.

"If you want me to stay, I'll stay." He said, sometime.  
They'd been standing there for a long time, locked together. His arms were cold. Likho's fingers leaving soft grooves in his skin.

Likho hadn't said anything, so Kian had stepped away, and headed for the door. He was almost over the threshold when Likho spoke. 

''I'm not begging.''  
It wasn't a 'please', but Kian knew what he meant. 

***

"Likho's got beard rash." Enu told him one night while they were providing cover for a scout group in the neon-lit alleyways near the Sonnenchein Plaza.  
They were huddled in an damp balcony on the older side of the plaza, squinting through sniper rifles at the trading going on below. And this of all times, was the time Enu chose to try and squeeze him for gossip. Of course it was.

Kian frowned, a bead of sweat trickling down his forehead. His palms were sweaty, heat radiating from the artificial sun in the Plaza.

"...Kian? You wanna explain?"

"No."

"....please explain?"

"Enu. Focus."

*** 

Likho smoked after sex. 

There was an image Kian didn't know he wanted- the light filtering in bars through the grate above, throwing Likho's naked body into sharp contrasts of light and shadow. The smoke curled from his open mouth, thick and alive in the shafts of light. He looked like he belonged on the pulp cover of some retro Noir book. 

The Apostle laid back on Likho's bed and felt a weird sort of contentment settle in the pit of his stomach.

Here, in the middle of a quiet war, breathing in second-hand smoke and watching a Likho, he felt a little like himself again. 

***

The second EYE operative they caught was shaking. Too young underneath the mask he had on. They had him sobbing in seconds, but he confirmed what they knew.

April was alive. And their Intel was correct. 

Likho wanted to kill him, but Kian argued to let April decide when she got back. Snide marks about his allegiance stung a little, but he couldn't let the boy die.  
He still wasn't entirely sure why Likho agreed either. 

****

Oohhh shit this was a weird situation.

Kian sometimes missed the parts of his life where he was living in a fancy apartment with a nice view and a lot of money, not the parts where he lived underground and was in a fucking-with-no-feelings agreement with the Propasts Public Enemy number One. 

And then sometimes someone would clap him on the back or slip him extra food rations, or Likho would make a soft, breathless sound against his naked skin and... yeah, Kian could settle with this.

**

''Oh my god, don't look at me.'' 

Enu was bright red, hauling a grey squat box from a salvaged crate and pulling it open. The weapons inside were disassembled, and she sat on the concrete floor and began the arduous task of piecing the rifle back together, bit by bit.  
Kian sat next to her, opening the second box up and squinting at the components with disbelief. All for incineration. EYE threw out perfectly good weapons as soon as the newest upgrade was available. Luckily, some ex-member of EYE happen to know a guy on the incineration line.  
Now they had a few dozen crates of perfectly workable weaponry.

''I am looking at you.'' He scanned the box, ticked off the checklist, and began assembling the weapon. 

''Well DON'T. Oh my GOD, Kian, you could have told me!''

''You could have knocked.''

''Well I would have if I knew you were banging our Leader! Oh my god that image won't leave me, I see it when I fall asleep, you know.''  
She hid her face behind the rifle. Her ears were bright red. ''Did you know Likho and April were a... thing? And you're banging him! Oh my god.''

''We're not twelve, stop saying 'banging.' ''

''Fine, you're penatra-''

''Stop! Stop.'' Kian held up a hand, cringing. ''Banging is fine.''

She sniffed in what he could only assume was a satisfied way, and tossed a small grey bolt from hand to hand for a few moments. He shouldn't have pressed the issue, but ...  
''April and Likho weren't a couple, Enu. He's definitely into men. Besides, it's nothing more than stress relief.''

''Well from what I saw that position is possibly the worst way to relieve s-''

''Please stop giving me sex tips.''

''Please stop banging Likho! It's weird, it's like I've found out that my two brothers are having sex!''

Kian pinched the bridge of his nose with his free hand in exasperation. ''I'm in my 30's and I live underground. The one vice I have right now is weird sex with a cyborg man just... let me have it.''

Enu clattered the assembled rifle down beside her and ticked off her own checklist before scrambling to her feet to haul the next box over. ''Y'know... I'm surprised he's banging anyone. Him and April are weirdly devoted to each other. They... truly love each other in some super-platonic soulmate-y way. '' Enu fixed him with her big puppy eyes. ''Maybe they're not a romantic-thing, but they're DEFINITELY a thing.''

Kian set the assembled rifle in the racks of other assembled rifles- not clattering it down on the ground like a savage- and went to pick up another box.  
''What happened to make them so close?''

''Uh.. I don't know exactly? Likho was sorta angry when he joined. In a rough place, and I guess April helped him see through the bad times? They keep each other going. Without her, I was sure he was going to combust. ''

''And he hasn't.''

''I guess not!''

''Because I've been _banging_ him.''

''Uggghhh!!'' She scowled and him and covered her ears, and Kian spent the next two hours of unpacking in a smug silence.

***

"Tell me about April."

He was naked, lying in bed, reading reports. Not typical bedtime reading- scavenging operations and what was collected during them, ration reports, supply requests, small bits of Intel. Looking at all this, he was truly impressed at the resistance. The Syndicate were trying to pressure people off the streets and into their dream machines.  
And this rag-tag group of people with next to nothing had said no made an impressive stand. They were more powerful than EYE had given them credit for.  
Than _he_ had given them credit for.

Likho grunted in response. He was sitting on the floor of the cramped room, head leant against the mattress behind him. The man had a Pad in his hands and was typing so fast his fingers were almost a blur. Kian tried to get a look over his shoulder but it was all in ones and zeroes.  
Kian didn't know when Likho had started letting him help with the admin work, but he liked the...companionable silence? Silence was best, they still bickered when they talked.

"What do you want to know, Apostle?"

Hmm.

"I'm trying to rescue April because it's my fault she's caught. But I never knew her the way you all seem to. So, what was April Ryan like?"

Likho paused for a moment, finger hovering over the '0' on the pad. "She IS." He said testily. "Not WAS."

"Of course, I apologise."

"Huh." Likho craned his head to look back at Kian for a moment. He had shaved, his hair cut shorter and his beard trimmed for the first time in months. It suited him.  
"She is..kind. With a strong sense of right and wrong. She's an artist, she sees colour in everything. In people who do not see the colour in themselves."

Kinas brow furrowed, and he went to put his hand on Likho's shoulder, but stopped himself. Likho didn't notice, going back to his work.  
When their work was done, Likho took the sheets and data pads and locked them away in a solid grey safe hammered into the concrete walls. He blocked the view of the combination with his body, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Kian wasn't watching. 

''Watch out, I recently developed the ability to see through solid objects.'' He commented dryly from the bed, and was sure Likho rolled his eyes.

''I assume you think you're staying the night.'' Likho flicked off the light and flopped into bed, making the thin mattress creak. 

''Mm. C'mere.'' Kian rolled closer, and when the man leaned in, he kissed Likho like he loved him. He pressed their lips together, tucking the man's body close to his and demanding nothing, kissed him. Just a gentle, quiet kiss, giving him time to make a decision.  
He considered this an experiment- this was what Likho needed, right? The affection April gave him, but since they actually weren't as close as that, thoughtful kisses would have to do. 

Besides, he ..liked it. Just because this wasn't a marriage didn't mean they couldn't treat each other like they mattered, right?  
There was a tense pause, and then Likho damn near melted into his hands. An arm curled around his waist, and he was kissed like Likho loved him too. The man felt hungry to kiss, like he was soaking up every drop of affection tossed his way.

It wasn't love. But they could kiss like it was. Because why not?

Kian kissed him like that from then on. In the days, he trained the rebels, kept up with the medical checkups on his healing scar. He went on scouting missions, showing rebels where EYE was weakest. He helped with tactics, chatted to Bip, went on errands with the others.

During the day, Likho was his leader, his colleague. His begrudging acquaintance.

At night, Likho was his...well, _his._ The sex wasn't anything to scoff at, but sometimes it was just lying naked, lazy kisses, finding out that Likho was ticklish under his arms. Discovering that Likho was surprisingly, really good at back massages.  
Finding out that you didn't need excuses for someone falling asleep on your chest when it happened that often. 

Finding that the mistrust and stressful workloads during the day didn't matter when that evening you got to doze pressed against someones' chest.

It wasn't love. Likho was a dick and Kian was an ex-fascist. It was still stress-relief.

But... 

It was nice to feel needed, even if it was just for what he brought to the table. It felt like a little bit of normality.

***

''Hey, Likho's set a date for the rescue attempt! Everything's almost back to normal!''

_Shit._


	4. Revelations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At this point, Good Decision and Bad Decisions are becoming impossible to differentiate between.

"I'm a..."  
The bespeckled man paused for effect, fingers lazily strumming the guitar in his hands. "Singer-songwriter..." He crooned to his assembled listeners, closing his eyes in an attempt to seem deep.  
In a grate by the buskers feet, Kian tried not to scoff. Drowning out the pretentious warbling, Apostle took a deep breath, and savoured the air. It was heavy with smog - and hey, he was still in a drain- but it was close enough to the surface that it didn't taste like sewer, so it was already an improvement.

A movement at his elbow signalled that Likho had materialised by his elbow. Kian suppressed a little flicker of pride that he no longer jumped when the Rebel did that.

"Did you get to Queenie?" Likho muttered, casting his eyes upwards to make sure no-one was peering down the grate like a cartoonish villain. No-one was. Because of course they weren't.

"She said she'll consider it."

"It'll do. Here. Mr. London says hello."  
After what was almost certainly a compliment, Likho tossed him a briefcase. Catching the surprisingly lightweight case, Kian cracked open the lid. Inside was sleek EYE armour.

''Operative Vleskin. One of our insiders. It's a perfect forgery.'' Likho sounded pleased. ''He gave us his passwords for everything, and the voice synth should mask your difference. The attack will happen before he's scheduled to arrive in for his shift. Hopefully no-one will notice in the chaos.

''Do we have a safe extraction for Vleskin?''

''He's already got contacts preparing a safehouse for him in Iceland.''

Kian felt emboldened for a brief moment. They might actually pull this off. Backed by the enigmatic gangster and the wry old lady, their numbers were growing.  
''So what now?''

''Now, we go get a drink.'' Likho clapped a hand on his shoulder, squeezing past him in the narrow passage. Kian followed, mildly surprised.  
''Club Bitte? Met Gargan Garlanka in there once.''

''Not quite.''

***

The bar on Jarl Street was straining to even be called a bar. The electricity flickered, the bar itself was sticky, and everything smelled damp, but the barman didn't care who they served, so it would do. They sat knee-to-knee in a lopsided booth in the basement bar, drinking warm flat beer, playing cards and trying not to touch anything.

Enu appeared soon, squashing into the booth beside them, bringing along some of the others. The excuse for beer was passed around merrily and it slopped and spilled in as many places as it could. Cards curled and got soggy from the spilled dregs, and Kian lost count of the amount of times he was elbowed in the ribs by someone who got too excited with their hand.  
Someone told a stupid joke and they laughed till their sides hurt. It wasn't funny, but Kian didn't care. It felt good to laugh with family. It felt good to HAVE family.

Likho won all the card games that night. Even on his worst hands. Kian's aces were fumbled into a bad play, Old Bobs' winning hand was folded far too early, and Enu's good cards ended up mysteriously crammed into Kian's pockets. Both of them pretended not to notice.

***

Likho's face was pressed into the crook of his neck, body weight settling over Kians. Steady, long fingers cradled the crown of his skull, gently keeping his head tipped back unto the thin pillows. Well, they weren't stopping him from moving, but he wouldn't have moved regardless. Likho's mouth was working wonders on his neck.  
So it turned out Likho was incredibly good with his mouth. Kian shuddered, teeth digging into his bottom lip to keep quiet. Likho was slow and meticulous, as he had been for the past several minutes.  
Sometimes he moved up for a proper kiss, other times, it was just this quiet slow build. 

His heart thudded soft and low in his chest, the only sound he could hear apart from their breathing and the soft sounds of Likho's mouth moving over his skin. 

He was beautiful, Kian thought, running his fingers through the loose strands of hair tumbling from Likho's hair bun. The leader of the resistance, with his one good eye and his soft, scowling lips. His ugly scars, his angular cheekbones and broad shoulders and soft stomach.  
And he was here. With Kian, accepting him against all odds. He was here and trusting and willing and Kian had to take a moment, torn out of the mood. That sort of realisation always made his head spin. 

''Kian?'' Likho murmured, seemingly catching the change in mood. He moved up a little and settled to lean over the Apostle, his Apostle, because wasn't that what Kian was now? If he was following anyone faithfully into the jaws of death, it wasn't the Syndicate. It was Likho.  
Impulsively, Kian breathed Likho's name. Not his code-name, not the one he claimed as his own, the name that he was given, the one on  
the old records. And the way Likho sighed against his mouth and melted into him was enough.

The funny thing about kissing someone like you loved them was sometimes, even partly, you stopped needing to pretend.

***

Morning dawned grey and still, and it was tense.

Everything was tense. The people. The air. Even the walls seemed tense as the rebels crowded shoulder-to-shoulder in the supply tunnel under the prison sector. Crammed in like sardines, every single available fighter they had was assembled, decked out in stolen weapons, cobbled weapons, and the steely determination of people ready to fuck something up.

Everyone had a job, the admins, the creative types, the speakers, even the cooks. Everyone was here. Everyone was ready. Even Bip had begged to come, but Kian had sent him back to the other children, and earned himself a miffed glare in the process.

''You all know your jobs.'' Likho was saying to the crowd. ''We won't all come back. But at least EYE gets a boot up the ass. Kian.''

Sod it.

"So. This is what we're here to do." Kian scratched his nose, hoping that the stoic act hid the fact that he couldn't have felt more awkward. "Remember, the armours weak point is the neck and under the chest plate. Hit hard enough that they don't get back up. " No-one clapped, but instead they stamped, feet rattling off the concrete, pairs of eyes, angry and determined, fixed on him.  
Kian met Likhos' eyes, and received the faintest of nods. 

Everyone moved on some hidden signal. Half of the crowd scattered into nearby tunnels to reach their planned stakeouts or relay points. Enu headed a bunch of angry looking girls who all bore some mix of the same dragonfly marking. She slipped away with them before anyone really noticed.  
Likho and the other team loitered at the border, waiting for the second signal to storm the compound.

"Well." Kian, and lingered by Likho's side for a second longer.  
It turns out that last words were incredibly hard to come up with.  
"See you on the other side."

"Goodbye Kian."  
And they were moving together, hands clutching skulls to crush mouths to a join. Teeth snagged on his lip and his beard must have been scratching uncomfortably against Likhos chin. If Kian ever had to define a kiss as a 'goodbye' kiss, it was this one.  
Likho broke away and pressed their foreheads together, and they stood silently for a moment, eyes closed. One last moment to block out the world.

Kian stepped away while he still could, and their hands slipped from the others neck, back to hanging limply at their sides. He wished suddenly that he could have one last image of Likho laughing, naked in bed, smoke trailing from his fingers. Likho on his knees, fingers tangled in his white hair as he licked his lips. Likho sleeping beside him, lips curled into a soft scowl in his sleep.

One last anything.

He nodded once, turned on his heel, and jogged away.

***

No-one paid attention to the EYE member striding past in Trooper armour. Vleskin had been slim, and the chassey lining rubbed uncomfortably off his broader shoulders, but he was safe so far.

The man's card and password got him past the first two checkpoints. He strode like he was supposed to be there, and jammed all those nervous thoughts firmly to the back of his head.

''So what happened Vles?'' A voice called as he passed the break room on the first floor. Two younger men sat chatting over cups of proper coffee, helmets discarded on the desk. One of them had the sad attempts at a proper beard. The other had one of those holo-mohawks in vibrant yellow and pink.

Boys. Kian realised with a shock of familiarity. They were just boys.

''Well?'' The boy with the beard troubles leaned forward, grinning. ''Did you end up taking her home?''  
Kian paused, and improvised. He nodded.  
''Well?'' Said Mohawk, sitting up a little straighter. ''How was she in the sack?!''

Kian paused, bit back a response, and wiggled his hand in the universal signal for 'eh'.

He left, with the two troopers catcalls echoing after him.  
Boys. Just boys.

***  
The corridors felt a little like home, but the prison sector had an uncomfortable feeling to it, the way hospitals had the smell of antiseptic. The prisons long stretching halls, dim lights and lack of colour made him feel like he was in a never-ending maze. After a few minutes it was already messing with him, he didn't want to think of what people here for years were like.  
The architect must have been a complete cock.

The corridors in the prison sector were lined with cells, covered with glowing bars similar to the ones outside Propasts EYE HQ. Energy beams that could be modified to keep out the people who needed to be kept out, or in this case, keep in the people that needed to be kept in.

Kian kept walking. Most of the cells were empty. The prison quarter didn't keep prisoners they didn't need.  
After walking what seemed like several blocks, he found the cell he needed.

A pale woman with dark hair sat at the end of a long corridor. 15 bars of light shimmered between her and freedom, throwing a sickly green light unto her face as she sat on the thin regulation mattress that counted as a bed. There were no guards. There was no need. Those bars would fry anyone who touched them, and if an enterprising soul managed to get past that, the security system would alert every EYE Operative in the vicinity, lock down the block, and pump neurogas in through the vents. If anyone survived all that, they'd be subject to whatever Vamon thought was a good punishment. Kian figured that the smart ones stayed in their cells.

"Hello." The woman watched him approach. She sat where she was and idly itched her forehead, where little polygons of medigel had formed a patchwork that healed smaller cuts and bruises. Kian had seen her as she was arrested- covered in dust and debris and god knows what else, but those cuts hadn't been there then.  
Not for the first time, he wondered how he could have endorsed any of this.

"April. April Ryan."

Sun-bringer watched him calmly, and he was reminded of Likhos' silence, how it was evident how much there was bubbling under that paper-thin strength. Only on April, it seemed to fit. The paper-thin strength was solid, here. A second of eye-contact and he could see the walls building up around her.  
He nearly smiled under the mask. Months of captivity, and all of Vamons' tricks hadn't broken her yet.

"Come with me."  
He waved her through the bars, and April stayed where she was.  
There was a distant boom, and the lights flickered. The blue shimmer of the bars crackled violently and faded, and Kian, feeling a little smug, waved her through again. What timing.  
April slowly got up pressed a hand to the edge of the cell with a sort of fearless lack of hesitation that was both admirable and insane.  
Nothing happened, and she stepped through.

"Likho?"

Kian shook his head, and pulled his helmet off. Aprils dark eyebrows raised a little, but if she was surprised she didn't show it.  
"Alvane. I know you."

"You do."  
"You blew up my operation and had me tranquilised."  
"Yes. Sorry about that." Kian worked quickly and knelt, snapping open the catches and buckles of the standard-issue boot. The armour clicked and folded away, revealing another set still around his foot. Perfect craftsmanship- armour within armour. He kicked the spare boot her way. Then the other. Then his gloves. 

April caught on fast, pulling on the clunky pieces with thin fingers.

"The cameras?"

"EMP pulse took them out. Locked out the mainframe. We have a few minutes before auxiliary power comes back online and they gas us." He helped her buckle the chest plate in place, and when the helmet slid down, she could have been anyone. They both could have been. 

''Likho and your friends are waiting outside.''

April took a moment to take a deep breath, and nodded, composed. ''Then lets go.''' 

***

''Scorpion is gone!'' Kian shouted, jogging towards the first group of troopers they met coming in the opposite direction.  
''Shit!'' The team leader cursed, shoulder their weapon. ''Go report to Vamon, we'll start a search.''

''Affirmative.''

And just like that, they strolled out of the prison quarter.

In a base of running people, they blended in . 

***

The courtyard was in chaos. The dead and the dying lay everywhere. Likhos group was corralled in the middle, some of them even wearing cobbled bits of EYE armour they had pulled off their opponents. They were taking heavy fire.  
The EYE men and women camped by the building-front didn't have a change, ambushed by two of their own side. Shot in the back, they fell in droves, leaving a lull in the chaos. Kian bit down the guilt, and kept moving, waving April ahead of him and taking up the rear.

''Don't shoot!'' Likho was shouting to his own, and they crossed the wrecked courtyard at a sprint, the hum of airborne EYE reinforcements droning in the background.

Shit.

''To the tunnel!'' Kian shouted, breaking into a run. The ground was peppered with bullets, shells smashing into the concrete, shrapnel tearing at their legs as they ran to safety. The man beside him crumpled with a spray of blood. Another fell, shot in the leg, and was dragged along by her friends.

They tumbled into the underground passage, a mess of panicked limbs and weapons. Kian extracted himself from the pile and helped reseal the entrance. 

''Go, GO!''

They corralled together the dying and wounded, and met with team B back at the tunnel junction.

They ran, then.

***  
After a time of looping back and building barricades and traps and masking their path, they stopped, set up guards, and tended to their wounded.  
And they all breathed for the first time in a few hours.  
One of the medics had been shot in the torso, and she was propped up against a wall, her breathing quick and shallow, eyes glassy and unfocused. Her breathing sounded wet. In the confusion of counting the survivors, April pulled off her helmet and knelt, grasping the woman's hand. For the first time since the Prison, Kian saw something that was genuine emotion on her face. 

"Oh, Na'ane..."  
"April..?"

At her voice, Kian could feel the equilibrium of the room shift. The shouts erupted around them as everything sank in, and people surged for April. Kian was subject to a fair amount of hugs and back-pats, but he was second to Sun-bringer. Surrounded by her flock, she was a religious figure. The Shepard and her Sheep.

It was just a title, she said once, and he believed her. THIS was why she was important. She loved her people, and they loved her too. In a world of cold technology and WATICORP trying to trap people in their own greed, this ragtag group refused to be anything else but human. It was wonderful  
Likho was in the throng, and they parted for him. He hugged April like he was folding them together, and they clung like they were two halves of a whole.

Kian couldn't look away.

***

''Alvane?'' April fell into step beside him as they walked. It had taken a full day for people to stop approaching her, and even then, people passed to touch her shoulder, smile at her, as if checking she was really back with them. 

''Kian is fine.'' He hoisted the rifle higher on his shoulders. 

''Likho told me what you did. Thank you.''

''You don't need to thank me.''

''No, you kept him sane. You helped my people. So thank you.''

''They're good people.''

''Yes they are.'' She glanced over at Likho, who was walking stonily next to a chatting Enu, and trying very hard not to smile at her chattering.  
''Was he okay?''

''Sometimes.'' Kian didn't want to share anything else, and she didn't press him. 

***

They walked for days, traversing the underground systems in groups. It'd take a week to confuse their tracks enough to head safely back home.  
They walked, and walked. And walked.

***

Three days later, they were sitting around a fire in the depths of the sewer system, passing around slabs of protein solids and chatting. The elation had worn down into plans for a party when they got back, but the original giddiness of their success was slowly smothered by their dead and wounded. Kian sat beside Enu, and saw Likho break his ration in half and hand it over to April. She broke her own in half and handed it back to him, and they smiled at each other. Something tugged at Kians' chest.  
It would be easy to say it was jealousy, some chest-thumping Alpha-male hangup. But it wasn't a bad feeling. It was overwhelming, but not negative. He supposed they had all the time in the world now to figure out what it was.

He handed his ration to Enu, and grabbed his water canteen, getting up for a refill.  
''Hey.'' In an adjoining tunnel, he felt a hand on his arm. Likho was standing behind him. He looked more relaxed than Kian had ever seen him before. His usual scowl had softened into something more gentle.  
''Thank you.'' Likho said. '' You brought her home. ''  
Kian nodded. ''Don't mention it.''

There was a pause.  
''I'm happy for you.'' Kian admitted after a moment. ''I've never seen you look this..''  
''Relaxed?'' There was almost a joke in Likho's voice.  
''It suits you.''  
In the quiet, they grinned at each other. Likho's hand still lingered on Kian's arm, and neither of them moved. The little bit of hope felt infectious. They were going to be okay.

''Kian-''

A scream tore down the tunnels, raw and terrified, and then everything went wrong.  
There was a flurry of activity, the rebels on watch duty were shouting, panicked, then something solid hit Kian in the temple. 

He hit the ground dazed, and Likho joined him soon afterwards as the world faded into black.

***

_''Kian's mommy hated him so much she jumped into the river!'' He was nine, wiping the blood from his nose as a boy with a front tooth missing sneered. ''They found her all, all bloated and gross and bluurrghh.'' The boy made a grotesque face, and then Kian planted his fist in the middle of that face, and hit him till the other boys dragged him off._

Slowly, the image faded and reality reared its ugly head.

Everything hurt, aching right down to his bones. He was on his knees, armoured hands pulling his arms behind his back. Bile clotted in his throat and he retched involuntarily, spittle dotting his lips and chin.  
April was across the fire from him, in the same position, flanked by two EYE Troopers. Her bloody nose indicated she had put up more of a fight than he had. Likho was in between the both of them. Everyone else was either pressed face-first against the tunnel walls, hands flat on the cement, or in similar kneeling positions. EYE were everywhere, and a solid pair of boots stomped between Kians vision and the others.

He didn't have to look up to feel his heart sink. The boy with the missing front tooth had since gained a set of adult central incisors, and a face scar, but sadly he was no less of a completely dogged bastard.

''Evening Alvane.'' Vamon was pacing between them, hands clasped smugly behind his own back. '' You look like shit.''  
''I feel like shit.'' Kian closed his eyes, trying to soothe the throbbing in his temples. How had EYE known? How had they been ambushed? The teams that were on watch duty should have seen a threat coming..

''I was under the impression you were killed months ago. It was all over the news. Care to explain?''  
Kian didn't bother to respond. Verbal sparring wasn't something Vamon was good at, but punching was. There was no point riling him.  
''How did you know where we were?''

''Scorpion is our prisoner. MY prisoner. We implanted a tracking device when she was tranqed.''  
''That's not regulation.'' Kian objected, and received a back-hand across the face for his troubles. His head snapped painfully to the left, his left cheek stinging. He could see April strain against her bonds, staring at Vamon like she wanted to skin him herself.  
''I am regulation, you little shit.'' Vamon tilted his head to one side , considering everything.  
''So you're Apostle, Alvane. Sun-Bringer and Apostle. Isn't there another one? Likho? The one-eyed, that must be you.'' He cocked his gun at Likho, who bared his teeth in response.

''Don't be stupid.'' Kian lied through his teeth, circling his jaw slowly as it creaked. His pride stung more than his face. ''The mythical creature Likho was a one-eyed WOMAN. That cyborg is a glorified bodyguard.''

''Then I guess he isn't necessary.'' Vamon clicked back the safety latch with a thumb and Kian couldn't help himself. He flinched. As did April, from across the fire pit. Vamon smiled that thin-lipped, cold grimace of this and lowered his weapon. ''Oh. Interesting.''  
Likho was glaring at them both. Both April and Kian were staunchly looking at anything but him.

''The man from the tunnel.'' Vamon grabbed Likho's hair, yanking his head back. Kian could see the muscles of Likho's throat work, stretched taut under the skin.  
''Nice eyepiece. You think he'd scream if I ripped it out?''  
''Get fucked.'' Likho growled through gritted teeth, and Vamon smiled again. It was an ugly smile.

''Mouthy for a bodyguard. Maybe I'll take his tongue.''

_He could move, shrug off the guards, tackle Vamon away from Likho. He'd be shot in seconds but he could distract him for a second-_

''We'll co-operate, just don't hurt him.'' April was saying, with an expression like she was swallowing glass. She looked beaten, drawn and tired, much more than the defiance she showed minutes ago, and Kian would have burst out laughing if everything else about the situation wasn't horrible.  
Oh, she was GOOD, but he didn't believe her for a second. She was playing Vamon at his own game. Waiting for something, maybe? Keeping the idiot posturing. 

Vamon felt like he had the power now, Kian could see it in him. He was dangerous like this. But April? He had the feeling she could handle it. Somehow. 

''Weeks of torture, and you break now. Over this? Over HIM.''

''Everyone has their weak spots.'' April allowed.  
''Good to know. '' Vamon waved between him and Likho. ''One of them gets to share a cell with you this time. Which one dies?''

''Save him.'' Kian said instantly, and only as it echoed through the tunnel did he realise that he hadn't spoken alone. He glanced over at Likho, who looked at surprised as he felt.  
''Putting a pin in that drama..'' Vamon gestured back towards them. ''Which one, Scorpion?''  
April considered. She glanced up towards the high ceiling, and nodded as if to herself.  
''Fuck you.'' She offered.

The guard holding Kians' arms sagged and gently crumpled to the side. A dart imbedded softly in the weak point on his neck. Something was moving above, clattering on the metal pipes that crisscrossed over the intersections, and then the others guards started dropping, one at a time.

The fight was brutal. The scout teams above dropped to free the pinned rebels and the EYE retaliated quite badly to seeing their friends ambushed, and it all sort of went from there. Blasts from Pulse rifles echoed in the tunnels, lighting it up like the neon world above. Kian's feet wedged in the back of Vamons' knees, driving him down. April's uppercut left the man staggered. He had gone for his weapon, but Likho's knee jammed into his ribs had him dropping. 

''Get the others to safety!'' April ordered, shouldering past the others and into the fray.  
There was chaos everywhere. Screams and shadows dropping from above, ambushing the EYE. Snapping bones and the smell of burning. A body had pitched backwards into the fire.  
A bunch of Dragonfly girls were corralled at the far end of the tunnel. They were fighting hard, but they weren't armed well.  
There was a twisted metal bar in his hand, and he was moving.

 _Hit the first Trooper in the face, point of the bar at the weak point in the reinforced glass. "The next one comes from the side, aim for the ribs. If you feel a crunch you hit right. Duck, tackle. Hit them in the face, daze them, snap their neck._  
The dragonflies took take of the stragglers. And Kian turned back to the main fight.

Likho and April were fighting off troopers in an alcoved tunnel. She had found a metal rail to use as some sort of a staff, and she moved in tandem with her general, taking the men down with precise, cold, strikes.

Through the chaos, he saw Vamon stagger to his feet. Kians legs were already moving, lunging for Vamon as the Officer fumbled for his gun, aimed and fired.

The blast of light was momentarily, painfully blinding. Everything seemed to stop for a moment, even his heart seemed to seize in his ribcage. Two bodies crumpled, and the world sped up again.

There was an inhuman howl of anger that he barely registered as coming from him own throat. Kian slammed into Vamon, wound his fingers in that dark hair and drove the man's head against the concrete till his hands were wet and Vamon was still.

***

There was a single, persistent ringing in his ears as he stumbled, tattered and dazed, through the debris. The dead and the dying were everywhere. Kian ignored them all. He couldn't seem them as people now, not people with loves and dreams and hopes, if he did there would be too much loss to handle. So he focussed on one, and knelt beside Likho. 

Likho lay still on his back, hands splayed out like Christ on the cross. April lay over him, her chest to his chest. The blood on her back was sticky and blackened, congealing around the wound. He went to check her pulse, but his hand stilled and dropped. He knew a dead woman when he saw one.

Numb, he gathered April in his arms and gently lifted her. Her blood oozed, sluggish over his hands. She lay oddly in his arms, a dead weight, limbs awkward and wrong.  
Sun-bringer was laid carefully on her back on the nearest clean slab he could find, and he turned back to Likho. 

_No, no no nonononono..._

Likho was covered in blood, all of it not his own. The shot had ripped through April and hit him in the chest. Her armour and body had slowed the blast enough to save her friend- who was bleeding, and from the looks of his ashy skin and short, sharp breaths, in the throes of shock.  
He was completely out of it. But he was alive for now.

Kian knelt, and stared, and felt empty.

There was a commotion behind him and someone thudded to the ground. Enu and a handful of the others stood over the body of the last EYE operative.  
When his brain eventually allowed him to interact with the world again, someone was saying his name. Feeling drunk, Kian staggered to his feet, and turned to look at their company. The dead and the dying were everywhere. Bloodstains on the walls. Piles of EYE corpses being dragged into a pile by survivors. Someone was screaming, their arm bent at a wrong angle.

"Kian?" Enu sounded scared. He didn't blame her.

"We move out." His voice hoarse in his own throat. He ended the conversation by showing them his back as he moved back to Likho. He didn't know what else to do.

"Don't die, you absolute bollock." He muttered, reaching out a shaking hand and pushing Likhos matted white hair back from his face. He bent to try and pick him up, but a hand on his arm stopped him. 

"We need to bring April back." Enu was choking back tears. "You should be the one to... yknow.''

***  
A mural was painted. A man with his hands soaked in blood. He walked with his head bowed, carrying in his arms the sun in human form. 

***

The looks he got when bringing April back were almost religious. The screams of disbelief, the hands tugging at him, at April, everything melded into a block of noise. Bip was shaking and crying, clinging tight to Kian as they laid April out on a hospital bed. People were clamouring, pushing to see her, and getting more upset when they did. 

Likho lay on a separate bed in the dim complex, fussed over by medics. 

Kian excused himself, gently untangled Bip from his arms, and found himself in the dark hallway outside the medical wing. He crouched, leaning his back against the damp wall and sinking his head slowly into his hands.

***

Nothing had ever prepared him for the sounds Likho make when he woke and heard of April's death. A human being shouldn't be able to sound so sad, Kian had thought, feeling the sound rip through him, raw and furious and scared. It sounded like Likho was breaking.

He fought so hard to get up, against his own body and the medics, that they had been forced to sedate him, clapping restraints on his wrists to keep him from trying to get up again.

***  
''The blast did massive damage. Specifically to the heart.'' The medic was talking, and they sounded like they were very far away. ''Complete recovery is unlikely.''

''Do what you can for him.'' Kian ordered, running a hand over his face, feeling suddenly old. 

Likho lay still in his bed, liquids fed intravenously into his arm. He looked smaller, the sickly skin clinging to his cheekbones and making him gaunt, skeletal looking. The medicines gave off a bitter smell that stung Kian's throat, making his nose run, and the steady beep-beep-beep of the heart monitors felt like a cruel reminder of what had happened.  
Kian sat by his bedside, and held his lovers limp hand. He sat there and felt everything fall apart around him.

***

They had gathered for a meeting. And it somehow fell to him to chair it.  
The last thing he felt like doing was organising a meeting. What he did feel was wrung out. Empty. Like every single piece of stress and fear and anger had just faded into a numbness.  
Everyone around the meeting room, every single rebel that remained, looked the same. Some were wiping their eyes, others were shaking. Some held their heads high and clenched their jaws and some wouldn't look at anyone. They all looked how he felt.

They had lost family, he reminded himself. Friends and siblings, parents and teammates. Lovers. Children. They were reeling and they were just as lost as he was.

''When April Ryan was captured, she told me that Sun-Bringer was just a codename.'' He spoke up after what seemed like an age. _Come on, Alvane, dredge a speech up from somewhere._  
''I came to understand what she meant. The name itself is empty- it's the person she was that gave you hope. That gave you the courage to fight EYE, to risk your lives. Those names gave you the freedom to still be humans after you took the codenames off. To have families, friends, feelings, after all was said and done.''

''It hurts that they're gone. And it should. Sun-Bringer is a name. Anyone can be that name. But April? For those of you who put your hope in her, you're going to have to find other hope. Remember the faces of the dead. Remember them and get angry. Then stay angry, and make them pay for what they took from us. Whoever is still here tomorrow.. I'll assume you're with me. ''

He pushed himself off the desk, and left.

*** 

His room seemed smaller, closing in too tight, and by some stupid standard, his bed seemed bigger without another warm body squashed into it. Sweaty and restless, he suffered through the sleeplessness for half the night, but in the early hours of the morning, when fitful sleep was no longer enough, he tossed off his colours and padded down the hall to Likho's room.

The door creaked open, and he stopped.  
Enu was curled up in the chair beside Likhos bed, huddled under one of his oversized coats for warmth. Bip was squashed unto the chair beside her, face squished from sleep. Kian sat on the ground, leaning back against the bed, and held Likhos motionless hand. 

_You never believed in yourself, but look at the people who believed in you, one-eye._

***

The next morning, they slipped away before dawn, and Kian was the only one left. But the meeting room was crowded after breakfast. Eyes were puffy and red , but angry. Everyone there was spoiling for a fight, and he prayed it would keep them alive.

*** 

"You would have liked Aprils funeral. Well..no, you know what I mean. We got her favourite flowers and we tried to make it special."  
Enu was talking to an unconscious Likho when Kian passed, and he lingered outside for a moment before the guilt of witnessing a moment that wasn't his own became too much, and he made his escape.

***

The medics decided to dial back of Likho's sedatives. Enough for him to drift in and out of conciousness, but still drugged enough so he couldn't do something stupid. Kian was almost relieved til he saw the man lying listless in the bed, staring at the wall like he wanted to disappear into it.  
He lingered by the door. He came as soon as he could when they told him that Likho was awake, but he hadn't expected this. Likho's eye was dull and tired. He barely moved, not to cough, or drum his fingertips, or scratch. He looked small, and tired, and sad.  
He might as well have already been dead.

Kian pushed himself forward to sit beside the man, and Likho didn't spare him a second glance.  
''It's my fault.'' He croaked, and Kian felt his heart break.

''Likho.'' He murmured, moving to touch his hand, and Likho closed his eyes. He didn't move his hand, but he didn't reciprocate the touch either. Kian wasn't even sure if Likho registered his presence in the room at all.

''Shoulda been me.''

He didn't know what to say to that, so he placed a folded-up jacket on the bed. He had found Aprils room, and the chest with her clothes folded inside. This had been the most worn thing there.  
''I brought you something.''  
Likho's eye opened blearily and flickered to the jacket. Slowly, his fingers inched slowly across the greyed sheets to curl around the collar like a child clutching their comfort blanket. The man's good eye filled with tears, and he closed it tightly, holding the jacket like it was all he had. 

***

''You gave him her jacket? Why?'' Enu asked, scooping mounds of freeze-dried veg into separate bowls for the children's meal. Kian set out little pudding-cups on the plates for desserts, and cast an eye back at the children, but they were all too busy setting the canteen tables to listen in.  
''Because it'll help.''  
''How do you know?'' Enu asked, before looking at him and recognising the oversized grey hoodie he wore. ''Oh.''

Kian shrugged pretending not to know what she meant, turning back to his job.

''Look, I know it's hard to see him like that.'' Eu was trying again. ''He just needs time.. we all do. ''

''He's broken, Enu. This has broken him.''

''Don't say that.''

''Do you know whats stupid?'' Kian found himself saying out of frustration. ''For one bloody second I thought-''

''Thought what?''

Kian struggled with the words, and shook his head, staring at the metal grain of the table. ''I thought we had made it.''

Enu's hand descended, light and gentle on his shoulder. He thought maybe she understand what he had meant.  
''Go on and get some rest.'' She prompted softly. ''I'll take over here.''

***  
He paused outside of Likho's door, but couldn't bring himself to go inside. He shook his head at himself, and continued on to his own quarters, where he lay awake and stared listlessly at the ceiling.

The funny thing about kissing someone like you love 'em, is sometimes you stop pretending.

The funny thing about funny things, is sometimes it isn't funny at all.


	5. Redux

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath was the hardest part.

The murals were painted all over the city. 

The man carrying the sun in his arms.  
He walked, head bowed, and she burned bright, burning him too, turning his arms into charcoal and causing fire to run up inside his veins, burning him from the inside. 

Kian Alvane, the man who stepped away from the Syndicate.  
Whispers ran through the markets and through the Hand that Feeds stations and through the information brokers in the Chinese District. Kian Alvane was the man who had defied EYE. And he was coming for them. If you sided with Eye, he'd come for you too.

Once, for 30 seconds, some people swore they actually saw him too. The dream world in their machines went dead. And instead there was only Kian Alvane. Every report said that he said the same thing.  
''EYE only win as long as you fear them too much to fight back. I can't promise you safety, but I can promise you freedom. They only win so long as you cower behind closed doors and waste your days in the dream machine. If EYE couldn't convince their most loyal apostle to follow them, why should they convince you.''

One by one, people started to seek them out.  
As a symbol, Kian Alvane had never been more powerful.  
As a man, Kian Alvane had never been more fucked.

***

''Count.'' He ordered, lighting a cigarette. Enu never mentioned the smoking habit, but she side-eyed him every time he lit up.  
''Twenty-two.'' She poked at the nearest corpse with the butt of her rifle. The XOS-EYE armour clanked as she did.  
Outside of the watch station, an escort bot droned by.  
''They were ferrying intel.''

Kian took a drag, closing his eyes as he exhaled.  
''Download everything you can. Then torch the place.'' He turned and left, needing some air.  
He pretended not to notice her eyes on him as he left.

***

It happened quietly the first time. He was directing a group of rebels down a newly-discovered tunnel, and one of them- a cocky Casablancan woman, slapped him on the shoulder as he passed. ''Sure, boss.''

Boss. The others adopted the phrase. He was never Sun-bringer, and he preferred that. But he was no longer Kian. Not even really the Apostle, though that was still his codename. He was 'Boss' or 'Bossman', or some other version of the word.

***

''The heart will never work properly again.'' The medic was saying, handing Kian a pad full of medical jargon. He was just grateful that the medic herself was keeping things in simple words.  
''The exercises are going well, he seems to be determined..'' She paused, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth. Kian sensed the 'but' coming.

''But?'' He prompted, and she looked guilty.  
''Look, the blast.. it wasn't a typical pulse-rifle injury. It... has the potential to trigger massive heart attacks from the voltage. And while the shot didn't ..y'know. Kill him. It did seem to trigger a cardiac arrest, and that damage isn't going to heal. Maybe he'll get his strength back, but he's never going to be able to put the same amount of stress on his heart again.''

''His days on the field are over.'' Kian said heavily. The medic nodded. 

''Have you told him?''

''No.... no I thought..''

''I'll do it.'' Kian nodded, handing back the pad. 

Likho hadn't spoken much since they'd taken him off the meds. He'd struggled to get up even when he was too weak, and after it became apparent that he was going to keep struggling, they brought crutches for him. He started listless, and then that changed to restless. It was like being around a caged bear.  
He hadn't spoken much to anyone in about a month. On the better days, he'd let Kian sit with him for a while. On the bad days, he may as well have been dead.

On this day, he was sitting in his room, with a Pad in his hands. So maybe a good day. Kian almost felt bad about ruining it on him.

''I spoke to the medics.'' Kian said, and Likho's mechanical eye flickered, even if his human one stayed fixed on the screen.  
Kian stayed at the door, arms crossed. It felt odd to be any closer. He almost felt if he walked nearer that he'd hit the wall that had been erected between them  
''There's irreparable damage to the heart.'' There was a silence and for a while he thought Likho hadn't even heard him. Then he noticed Likho's hand. His knuckles were white, clenching the pad between his fist like he was going to break it.

''I'm sorry Likho.'' 

Likho's face twisted into a scowl, and Kian made a note. Anger.

***

''It wasn't your fault.''

''Shut the fuck up.''

Definitely anger.

***  
''One more lap.'' Kian held out his hand, and Likho bared his teeth like an animal in pain, in response. He had been going for laps of the gym without his crutches, slow steps, to get his body used to moving again. The slow walks left his breathing ragged, and he'd often sit, grey and shaking for a while after each one.

The man was in pain. His feet scratched, dragging across the mats, but he stumbled doggedly onwards. He tipped forward when he reached Kian, and Kian moved forward and caught him. He pulled Likho close to him, and felt the other mans chest heave against his own, sucking in air.

As soon as Likho could move again, he pushed Kian away from him.

***

''The man who owns that bar on Jarl street.'' Enu was at his elbow, watching him. Kian was standing in the doorway of Likho's old office, watching a gaggle of orphans run by, chasing a bot. The bot had been damaged, and repaired by someone in the resistance to shout 'PARTY' as often as it's processors would allow. Every so often it would chug by, metallic arms in the air with cries of 'PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY.' and followed by the orphans chasing it.

''We need to kill Partybot.'' Kian said, tilted his head in her direction but not actually turning to face her. ''I barely slept last night.''  
''Aww, it's cute! The kids enjoy it. Let it be.'' She tapped his arm and headed into his office, and he followed.  
''That's why I'm here.'' Enu said as he closed the door behind him. She hopped up on his desk, swinging her legs. ''The kids. You mentioned shipping them off?''

Kian nodded.

''The bartender has his own network. We can't get them out of the city, not after the lockdown, buuut.. we can foster them out to families. At least they'll be safe in their horribly oppressed city?''

It wasn't a perfect solution, but better in warm kitchens with plenty of food and..even dream-machines, than stuck in the dank bunkers. Kian nodded shortly. ''Get in contact.''

***

He told Bip about this plan on a cold afternoon a week later, and it went about as well as he expected.  
''I don't wanna go!'' Bip was nearly shaking in anger, his eyes wide and worried as he scowled at Kian, the walls, the floor, anything in eyesight. Kian sighed quietly, feeling his 'Bips Official Friend' badge being revoked.  
''It isn't safe here.''

''S'not safe anywhere. You can't make me go! ''

Okay. Kian told himself grimly. Try to make this as sympathetic and appealing as you can.

''Bip... listen to me. You're being sent to a place where you can have a normal childhood. Not like here. You'll thank me when you're older.''  
Bip stormed off, throwing an 'April would have let me stay,' over his shoulder. 

Kian took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose between finger and thumb. 

***

Likho still wasn't talking much. They'd gotten him a cane, and he limped around, out-of-breath and weak after even a few minutes. That just seemed to make his mood worse. Most times he could be found at the mural they painted for April outside of the mess hall.  
Kian found Likho next to the mural the first time the man had wandered alone from his bed. Likho had sat there for hours, head bowed. He shrugged off Kian's hand when he reached for his shoulder. He didn't say a thing.

***

The days were a mess of plans and orders and not enough sleep and too many variables.  
At some point, Kian left, needing to be anywhere else but the cramped bunker.  
His old Apartment. It was left exactly the way it had been when he was taken, and lay taped off and forgotten. Kian walked around the kitchenette, the perfectly-organised furniture, the wide-screen 3d television, the everything that a man could want. The place had been dusted for prints and searched a few times over. All his plants were dead, a thick layer of dust on everything else.

Kian didn't know why he bothered the risk of coming back, but he suspected that he was looking for something that had been lost in the chaos.

There was a photo on the sideboard near the TV. A young man in his 20's, back ramrod-straight, uniform pristine.  
Head shaved, the young man stared into the camera lens.  
Kian picked up the photo. He felt old now. That was over a decade ago. His forehead was getting lined, and he could grow a proper beard now, unlike the stubbly mess in the picture. He remembered standing on the steps with the other recruits, thinking that he had made it. If only the boy in the picture knew what he had become.  
He was tired, and cynical. He had killed innocent people. He had rebelled against this picture-perfect, empty life. He had...  
...he had fucked up, hadn't he.

Kian Alvane, the leader of the resistance, lover to a heartbroken man. Father-figure to a young boy who hated him.  
Heir to a legacy of a woman who held the sun in her hands.

He slept that night in his old bed, trying to feel like his old self for even a moment. 

In the early hours of the morning, Likho climbed into the bed and straddled his waist, kissing him hard. His hands found the curve where Likho's hips met his legs and Likho bit his lower lip and muttered how much he wanted to fuck him.  
He woke, sweaty and alone, the sheets tangled around his feet. 

Likho was back at the base, of course he was, the man couldn't walk further than a long corridor. But the dream had been good.

***

The days in that rebel office started to make the place feel like a cage. Plans, budgets, schedules, training regimes, supply runs... they all blended together. 

And Likho.. as the weeks passed and blurred into months, Likho remained closed off. It was only at Enu's coddling insistence that he even cut his hair and shaved. Kian had the suspicion that he wouldn't have even eaten if they didn't keep an eye on him.

''We lost power on the gates down in the walkways.'' Someone was saying. ''Had to use the manual overrides, but it slowed us down. Can't make supply runs alone anymore''

''Partner up.'' Kian waved him off impatiently, and maybe he was too harsh, because Enu slipped into his office later with a synth-paper cup full of watery coffee.  
''This is Vamons' work. Leading a band of armed soldiers ready to die at his command..'' He shook his head. ''A religious sister once told me that we slip into familiar patterns. If you don't play one role, you play the other.''  
''Like Vamon? No! Look, you made mistakes, but I believe in forgiveness. And you've earned it. That man was a monster.''

Kian shrugged.  
''I killed as brutally as he would. With as little mercy. What's the difference? That I did it for someone?''

''Yes! You're protecting us! You're nothing like him, Kian.'' Enu reached forward and squeezed his hand, and he couldn't help but smile at her. It was a tired smile.  
''The motive doesn't mask the action, Enu. I was as good as Vamon because I was as bad as him. And now you're all looking at me like I can pick up Aprils' banner. I..'' 

She patted his hand.  
''It's symbiotic, right?''

''What?''  
''Well, April and Likho! They worked because they were a team. Y'know, and then she got arrested and he was lost. Half of a whole! And then you come along and you help him. Your other half is him.''  
''But his is April.''  
''Right! So April..uh... dies. And he's lost, but now you've lost Likho too! So I dunno if I'm saying this at all right. Ugh, sorry! What I mean is, that you can't lead on your own. You need someone to balance you out, so. You're waiting for Likho.''  
He drained the coffee, feeling the bitter grit between his teeth.

''If anything, that made the situation more depressing.''

***

They hadn't talked since. A few days had passed, and it took the thought of what April would have wanted, to get Kian to drag himself from the mess hall and down the dim underground labyrinth to find Likho.

Likho was where he always was, sitting at the mural. Kian hung back, aware that Likho knew he was there, but didn't care enough to turn around. That sort of thing used to hurt, and now it felt worse. The straw that broke the camels back.

''Talk to me.'' He forced the words out of his mouth, and Likho kept his eyes on the wall ahead of him.  
''Talk to me!'' It was harsher this time, a desperate edge to his voice that he couldn't mask. ''I can't do this alone, Likho. ..i... '' Of all the things he could say, Vamon and April and Bip and Enu and the hundred other things weighing his soul down, the one thing that pushed its way to the front of his mind was: ''Don't push me away. Please.''

Likho's eyes had moved to stare at Kian. There was something in his expression, like he was seeing Kian for the first time in months.  
Kian turned on his heel, and left. It felt like it was hitting a nerve to stay.

***

He was working in his office, squinting wearily at a shipping manifesto for Waticorp antimatter devices, when the door was pushed open. Likho stood in the doorway, leaning heavily on a cane.  
He made it halfway across the room when he stopped and shot Kian a frustrated look.  
''Going to make me make the full journey?''

Kian pushed himself up and rounded the desk. He met Likho in the middle of the floor, and a hand curled in his shirt and yanked him forward til a mouth was pressed against his own.  
''I need some damn control.'' Likho muttered against his mouth, and Kian understood. ''April, the injury..I'm tired of feeling so fucking helpless.'' 

''Let me help you.'' Kian said, and Likho nodded.

He pulled back a little, just enough so Kian could notice the odd expression in his one good eye. ''I want you to fuck my face.'' He told Kian, and Kian's brain promptly left on an extended vacation.  
''What?''

''You heard me, Alvane. Are you up for it or not!?''  
Kian ended up sitting back in the old chair that used to be Likho's, legs spread as the man slowly struggled to kneel between Kian's knees. His head rested back against the lip of the chair, staring blankly at the ceiling as his space fingers curled and uncurled restlessly.  
There was a pained grunt as the man settled, hands on him, a rustle of cloth. Kian was almost certain he had fallen asleep at his desk again, lulled to sleep by the drip-drip-drip of the pipes in the background.

His fingers fisted tight in the white hair, and Likho licked his lips, opened his mouth, and gave a barely-perceptible nod. Go.  
The sounds Likho made choking on his cock was enough to fuel Kians' jerk off sessions for the next 40 years. His mouth was sloppy and eager, canting forward with a greedy jerk of his jaw til Kian cradled Likho's head in his hands and thrust hard into his mouth.  
Likho didn't want to think, he wanted to experience something of his own choice. Kian got that. But looking at Likho wasn't helpful to keeping this going for a while- Likho's eye was closed. His body was limp and pliant, letting Kian fuck into his mouth. His dark cheeks were flushed, hair tangled in Kian's hands as he took Kian's cock. He looked like he was having a religious experience.  
Kian understood- he felt like he was having a religious experience. 

Although praying had never felt as good as this

It sort of made sense to him. Even if Likho choked, even if the experience left him mouth raw, it was a discomfort he had chosen. That he had wanted. All those other pains he couldn't help, but this experience was his.

Kian woke the next morning. The bed was warm, and too cramped, made him nestle closer to that source of warmth. His feet were freezing, hanging over the edge of the bed, head pillowed on a soft torso that rose and fell softly. He opened his eyes, blinking the sleep away. A dark-skinned torso was the pillow in question, Goosebumps prickled over it. The figure below his head sighed, throaty and sleepy, and Kian turned his head, pressing his lips to the chilled skin. A hand moved from his back to run through his hair, letting the cold air creep in to chill the spot.  
Likho was lying on his back, supported by the pillows. The scars on his chest were a mess of twisted, healing flesh, and he looked as uncomfortable in his position as he did in any other. Kian leaned up, dropping a kiss to the right of the wound. When he raised his head, Likho's eyes were riveted to his face. He looked tired. He looked vulnerable.  
He said nothing. So neither did Kian. Instead, he kissed Likho, and feeling the naked body crane up for that affection was better than words.

*** 

''I'm not asking you to stay.'' Kian told him, pulling on his boots. ''But if you're here when I come back, then I'll assume you want to.''

Likho wasn't there when he got back. But a week later, the tap-tap of the cane at 2am signalled a body sliding in beside him. He was gone in the morning, but another few weeks later, he came by again.

He didn't talk at first, about April. The wound was still too fresh. But when Kian would wake to sharp, angry sighs and a wet face on the pillow beside him, he roll closer. He never once revealed that he was awake, and Likho never questioned it, why Kian would snore and shift closer when he needed reassurance the most. 

***

''April put me behind her. She took the blast. For me.'' Likho stopped, but the 'why' hung in the air between them. ''She thought you were worth saving.'' Kian told him, but Likho shrugged like he'd never even considered the thought.  
''If she'd just thought, for one fucking second...''  
He never finished his sentence. He didn't have to.

***

The children were sent from the base in the early hours of the morning. Bip hadn't spoken to Kian since their argument, but he broke character and threw his arms around Kian's waist before he left. Kian had untangled the boy quietly, and knelt, hugging him properly.  
He pretended not to noting the snorting sobs as Bip clung to him. He was just a child, Kian had to remind himself as Bip pulled back and wiped his nose with the back of his hand.

''Goodbye Bip.'' He managed, and Bip sniffed in return.

***

"PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY"

"Someone kill partybot." Kian muttered into the pillow, feeling the pitch of the  
Bots screeching drill directly into his poor delicate brain.  
"Mm." A corresponding grunt from the body beside him, and it shifted, a sleep-soft mouth pressing lazily against his throat.

It started slow, open-mouth kisses down his throat to the collarbone, deliberate and unhurried, and he nearly smiled. A hint of the old Likho, back here.

"You were talking in your sleep."

"Dreams."

"About Vamon." The name came out in a growl. Reverberating against the flesh of his throat.

"Do you know why we hated each other? Because we were too alike. Stubborn and damaged and proud, and we hated the other for what they'd do to succeed. One slip, one wrong move, and I'm him.''

 

"You bashed his fucking brains out." There was a deep satisfaction in Likhos words. "You've killed him. He's dead. Both metaphorically and fucking literally."

"I didn't kill him just to supplant him."

"You won't." Likho told him with such an air of confidence that it was hard for Kian to not believe him.  
"And if you do, I'll kill you myself."  
It drew a startled chuckle from him, and for a second he was almost comforted.

"Promise me." He said, and if Likho was surprised, he didn't show it.  
"I promise you." He said, low and serious, and Kian felt a weight lift from his chest. They would heal. Together.  
They would be okay, some day, if not now.

"-PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY PARTY-"

***

Kian Alvane. The man who carried the sun in his hands. 

They say there's a rebel group in Europolis. They say the leader is a man with fire for blood, and the man in the shadows behind him is half-bot. They say that they can't been stopped, or killed, or reasoned with.

If you're EYE, or Syndicate, or WATIcorp, then they'll come for you.

And if you're not, then they're waiting for your help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So...I ran out of inspiration for this one. I'm sorry guys, but after the games ending all my muse for this pairing sort of ran dry. I tried my best with this but it's not as well-written or detailed as I wanted it to be, and I'm sorry if that sort of spoils it for you.  
> Thanks for sticking with me for 5 chapters though! You're all great <3  
> Thanks to Framesonthewall and Lairofsentinel for their input and advice too! Lair did some neat art for this fic and you can find that HERE! http://lairofsentinel.tumblr.com/post/142944991351

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Dark-Rose89 over on tumblr for letting me brainstorm in her general direction, and for helping me get the details of this fic series hammered out. Without her input this would have been about 5000 times more rambling than it already is.


End file.
